To think hospital food should be better?

[Tortycat]

Currently in hospital with poorly dc2. I cannot believe how bad the food is! There's posters everywhere about 5 a day etc, but the food is a sea of beige. Tonight dc2 (15 months) was offered chicken nuggets and chips. As I'm still bf i was offered food (cheese sandwich). No idea what parents are meant to eat o/w as i cant take him off the ward and the only other food for adults here is a snack machine with chocolates (and no change machine). Breakfast was white toast, lunch was sausage and chips/ mash, or macaroni cheese. Overboiled carrot was only veg available.

I know costs have to be kept down, but how can they not serve healthier options (cheap stuff like baked potatoes, lentil soup, salads etc)? Any long term patients must be constipated and scurvy ridden! Needless to say ds hasn't been tempted to eat anything since we came in except some raspberries dh brought in

[EvilDoctorBallerinaRoastDuck]

It wasn't a courtesy meal, she's bfing.

[GetOutOfMYGarden]

The absolute best hospital food I've ever had (and I've worked in multiple hospitals) was at an NHS hospital - Alder Hey Childrens Hospital. It's cheap, it's absolutely delicious, and it's healthy - eg. £1 for some of the loveliest soup I've ever had and a bread roll. Because it's all made on site, with chefs working there to cater to the children's nutritional needs.

There needs to be a study into how exactly they've managed to do it yet at other hospitals I've been in I paid through the nose for awful food from the canteen and quickly learned that the costa/subway on site was absolutely my best bet.

[nocoolnamesleft]

One kids ward I worked on tried bringing in healthy options. Day after day they went in the bin, as they were rejected. Couldn't afford to keeo throwing food away. So back to beige crap. Which means that most of them will eat something. There's still veg come up with it. Hardly ever gets eaten.

[dahliaaa]

I was in hospital recently and the food was inedible. Really really awful. I was only in for one night so it didn't matter for me but there was an older woman on the ward who had already been in for two weeks and was going to have to stay longer. She said the food was really getting to her and she was finding it really difficult to eat it. It can't possibly have been helping her recovery.

[onlyonaTuesday]

When I had Dd2 20 years ago. I wasn’t allowed breakfast as I had missed the time slot 🤔 I had been in labour for 2 days.
Then when I ordered a cheese sandwich for tea they brought some brown glop instead.
In the end I got my df to go to KFC and get some buckets of chicken.
Everyone on the ward ate well that night

[Ollivander84]

School dinner type here too. I was on neurosurgery ward and happily ate it all
This was my meal two hours post op
Butter pie, peas and gravy
Orange juice
Bread roll
Yoghurt
Jam roly poly and custard
Ice cream (my throat hurt so they brought me some!)

[Ollivander84]

Oh and a flapjack and extra orange juice and two mugs of tea
I had fasted for hours then my op was nearly 5hrs. They seemed astounded someone was hungry and so kept bringing me extra food
The nurse also made me hot chocolate with squirty cream at 3am when I couldn't sleep

[TonTonMacoute]

YANBU. The last hospital food I saw was when my FIL was there. He was served up the most revolting piece of fried fish I’ve ever seen.

Food is food, why is it cheaper to cook it so badly that it is inedible?

[shorty6768]

When I had ds2 I wasn’t offered any food 😔 was starving too!
By contrast when I had my nose job privately, the hospital food was amazing. T-bone steak with dauphinois potatoes & vanilla Haagen Dazs 😍

[Jakeyboy1]

Putting the comments re the NHS is bankrupt/lucky to eat etc etc aside I think it's symptomatic of a much bigger issue in this country - food education. And if we got that right then it would also benefit the NHS by reducing dietary related illness (ok simplistic maybe but my point is the NHS should surely be setting an example?

The one thing that sticks in my mind from children's ward is my 9 month old being offered sugar by the TABLESPOON on cereal at breakfast! I mean come on have some fucking common sense!

[TonTonMacoute]

shorty and onlyona

That brings back bad memories too. I was offered no food until 12 hours after DS was born, and that was from one of the healthcare assistants, if I had waited for any of the nurses to notice god knows when I would have got anything.

[EdinaMonsoon]

Currently in hospital & have been shocked at how shitty the food is & lack of water. On my first day, I was admitted at 4pm & not offered a drink until the following morning. DH brought bottled water in for me. I have to have a gluten-free diet & have been met with lots of shoulder-shrugging at mealtimes & told there is no GF option - despite ordering it . If DH had been unable to bring food in for me then I would have gone hungry. The few things I have been able to eat have been grey sludge & inedible.

[blackteasplease]

I agree that kids should have healthy option although it's also true that getting any food into them is doubtless a plus.

What I really can't understand is the not feeding the parents of small children who have to be there to care for their child. It's not optional for a parent to stay even if they wanted to go. They do all the actual caring these days with the shortage of nurses, the nurses are restricted to just giving out medicines in my local hospital.

If you are a single parent with no local support god knows how you are supposed to get food! Fine once your child is old enough to hear "I'm nipping out to the shop, stay in your bed for 30 mins" but with a mobile toddler or pre schooler that just isn't happening - they'd be quite distressed and the nurses haven't the time to watch them.

But a parent who is well and has slept and eaten is crucial to the child's recovery.

[Shinesweetfreedom]

I bloody love hospital food me.Lister in Stevenage did a smashing selection.Even the vegi options were lovely.