To expect that a hospital should be able to meet my dietary needs?

[Balloonsandroses]

Pretty sure I’m not being unreasonable! Been in hospital 24 hours now and just been to eat a meal for the first time (my choice). There is nothing gluten free. I have coeliac disease which they’ve known since admission. Gluten makes me vomit. So I can literally eat pepper, cucumber and lettuce. To add insult to injury this is a psych ward and I was admitted under section (still furious about this) so I can’t even leave and go and buy some food.

Really feel for you. I have severe dietary issues and have had to go days without food before in hospital - even after being admitted with severe bowel problems. This is the reality of the NHS under Tory rule. I have admissions multiple times a year and I have never seen anything like how it is right now - terrifying is the best description. It's so awful but your food will be the last thing on their mind, insanity I know.

Because this is necessary for management of your AI condition, on this occasion I'd call PALs about it. Best not to kick off from my experience, just explain the situation and they should see sense. Hope someone can bring you food in and best of luck getting well soon

Diabetic dad with kidney failure given gammon ham (so v salty and a big no no) and full sugar icecream on a regular basis. He was in hospital (on a ward full of old men with similar self induced health conditions) for about 2 months so you’d of thought they would have realised….

but then again he was also told to get out if bed and take himself off to the loo when his “bag” was full. Less than a day after his leg was amputated. I think they were tormenting him …. (I would have done so too - he was a dreadful patient!).

I've had experience with this myself, I went in as they suspected I had pneumonia which I did, luckily I took a packed lunch anyway because I was going refuse to stay as I am a single parent of 2 children and had them with me when I went in and suspected they would try to get me to, they had a bed set up and said do I want to make myself comfortable but I told them as I said on the phone I couldn't as I had no other child care. Anyway they came round with lunches which I declined I had a packed lunch for myself and the kids and I queried if they could provide dairy free if I had been staying, which they said they couldn't so good job I wasn't staying as I would of been having to survive on black coffee.

I am diabetic, and was only offered food in hospital after a major operation that would have made me very ill - so I starved.

I hope this thread is educating those unaware of coeliacs disease that being gluten free isn't a mission to save the world by giving up groups of food or to lose weight but is due to medical necessity. I hope you can write to your local MP Once better and that in meantime family and husband can bring food to you, wishing you the best

I have severe allergies and during hospital stays last year and the year before was told they couldn’t provide any food that was safe for me. My husband had to bring all my food in cool bags and it was a pain with limited visiting hours. It was such an unnecessary extra stress when I was already really unwell. People who don’t have support locally must really struggle!

My partner brought me a chippy, whilst in 56hr labour, matron on, was overnight saint, will never forget her fortitude. Big hug to all who do it, I needed help, it was just so lovely to be fed when you would not be, and my quickie is a chippy x I knew she was breaking rules, 2007. Wouldn't happen now.

Can you get one of those travel fridges from Halfords? (They’re quite small, easy to carry and have quite good capacity)
You can then buy an adaptor, also from Halfords, to power it into a normal UK socket instead of the car plug.
I have one that I got for £70 and use it all the time for work. I lived in an empty property for 2 weeks with that and was VERY handy.

see thisTravel fridge

my post above about the fridge is for you..

Unlikely to be allowed on a psych ward. Cables, for one thing. Unless you can convince the nurses to make space for it in their office or something. And then there's the food to go in it, and asking for it to be made available when you need it, and just… psych wards are different from anything you already know, if you haven't been in one.

I once got through two weeks of a psych admission getting the majority of my calories from a giant tub of peanut butter I kept in my bedside cabinet, eating it with a teaspoon I'd smuggled out of the dining room. The fats/carbs/protein ratios are surprisingly acceptable in the short term, considering. Pretty sure the staff thought I had some kind of obsession or eating disorder or something alongside my other mentalness, but it was just the only way I could get safe and sufficient nutrition.

Ah just saw your update @321user123, sorry, thought your post was to OP.

I had a similar thing recently. Admitted with chronic pain due to gallstones. Doc states diet must be low fat. Can they produce a low fat meal? Of course not! The ward staff were great and sourced salad but it kept turning up with cheese! I subsisted on fruit and jelly.

Yanbu. My son has allergies (anaphylaxis) to egg and milk and we always have to provide all his food because hospital catering never seems to be able to cope

I’m still figuring out mumsnet 🙈🙈🙈
I didn’t realise it doesn’t tag people automatically if you press “reply”.
But yeah, I have type 1 diabetes (so eat basically almost Keto, because I eat very very low carb) and follow a halal diet.
I’m TTC, so that’s what I plan doing for my hospital stays, just have the mini fridge ready with all the stuff I need and can eat.

and tbh, if you also take medication, DO NOT give it to the hospital. Keep it on you in case they neglect you like it happened to other people on this thread.

Good luck hun xx

Sorry this was actually for a different poster not OP… I didn’t realise it didn’t take her 🙈

I wouldn’t dream that they would allow that on a psych hold just as you mentioned..
I think it’s shocking that hospitals aren’t careering for an AUTOIMMUNE DISEASE. It’s medical negligence imo and personally, I’d take it way further than pals for everyone else’s and my sake. But that’s just me 🫢

It's a medical condition, not a lifestyle or even religious choice.
Having said that, I had Gestational diabetes, my DH had to bring in suitable food as the diabetic choices were not even suitable.

The OP should consider complaining through Pals, if no-one complains, nothing will improve.

Yep sorry 321user123 the interface is kinda shitty and this kind of thing happens aaall the time, I shouldn't have assumed you were talking to the OP!

It's ridiculous isn't it? I wish this thread hadn't got derailed by the usual arguments about veganism and religious diets and whether hospital food is low quality and unpalatable, because those are totally different discussions IMO. Important, but different. This is about people who have no way to obtain their own meals (whether because they're too ill or because they're detained) being denied access to food that's physically safe for them to eat. In a hospital.

And I'd like to see how the "it's not a hotel" crowd would react if locked up against their will by the state, and offered only food that either definitely or probably has salmonella in it.

So offensive to call a vegan diet “daft”. Judgemental and uneducated in the extreme. Many many people make choices about what they eat for a variety of reasons. Sometimes health, upbringing, religion, worldview. someone’s lifestyle preferences should be catered for 100%, and medically necessitated diets even more so. I don’t like the attitude I see here - it’s a slippery slope. Removing someone’s choice based on your judgement of their choices is amoral and is the bedrock of much pain and abuse.

my fifth baby, born tiny, was admitted to hospital in November.
she was weeks old. I eat a plant based diet and the food was awful. The staff were wonderful and tried to accommodate, and tbh I was extremely worried and didn’t want to eat anyway and didn’t care. I lost three kilos in one week. But the point is the principal.
Food is basic. If you are in hospital, you are already having a hard time. Basic needs should be taken care of compassionately, and the importance of nutrition understood in a well rounded way.
on a psych ward, under section, they should be jumping through hoops to help you feel settled and cared for.

my teenager has ongoing mental health needs, and I know how crucial it is to make sure all the details are taken care of, because battling this stuff takes it out of a person.

This thread is reaffirming my decision to never move back to the UK if its so bad in hospitals! In Finland you might not get a nice menu to choose from but you do get the right food for your dietary needs (not just according to allergies etc. but also to medical need. For example when I was in a lot of pain after abdominal surgery they switched my meals to soft foods only as easier to eat and digest)

Most people are fat so hospitals get away with poor nutritional provision ("under-nutrition"), for short (1-15 day) stays.
It's a chronic recognised problem, but affects people with dementia worse than anyone able to post on here. People with dementia can just forget to eat at all. Especially if they don't fancy the food offered. When it's so hard to entice unwell people with dementia to eat, the food generally offered needs to be what they are used to & most often like.

If you are coeliac there should be an option for ordering gluten free I work in psychiatry and there's definitely an option . Some people do say they need a gluten free different diets when there is no clinical need and they are more expensive .

I am shocked by the nutrition in NHS hospitals, I had an operation abroad and I was offered high protein meals to aid recovery baked fish , salmon , stews. You get served slop over here nutrition is a massive part of recovery .

It's a safeguarding concern and would meet statutory criteria

S42 care act 2014, you have care and support needs (by virtue of needing MH admission), there is neglect by omission (failing to provide food you can eat, could lead to starvation or physical illness due to giving high food you are allergic to) and you are unable to take action to protect yourself by virtue of being in a Mh ward where you are not free to leave to go to shops to buy food. Ignore fact your DH can go buy food a 24 hour facility is responsible for feeding and watering you!

So they resolve this today - and get the food you can eat- or you report it as a safeguarding either directly to social care (they'll have an email you can use your phone with) or ask to see their safeguarding less in the hospital. I have zero tolerance for any hospital ward of care or care home that neglects it's patients/ residents like this.

Less= link person

I hope by now the problem is resolved. However, you should be able to order food in. Also you will get leave, even if only supervised leave and will be able to go to the shop. I hope you are on the mend soon.