BDA welcomes Lansley comments on ‘better patient nutrition’

Health Secretary Andrew Lansley told BBC One's Andrew Marr Show that "buying standards" would improve, prompting "better nutrition for patients". His comments follow criticism about the quality of food served in NHS hospitals and concerns some patients are receiving too little nourishment. Speaking about the health secretary's comments, chair of the England Board of the BDA, Anne Holdoway, said: "Acknowledgement of the importance of good food and nutrition for patients in hospital, ensuring that patients get the right nutrition and that it is 'personalised' is a positive statement indeed. "This now needs to be followed up with a concerted effort to tackle the wider issues in our hospitals and also through action in the community to prevent malnutrition developing before admission. "Registered dietitians are leading on many initiatives across the UK and collaborating with catering teams and healthcare professionals to ensure that hospital diets are nutritious and appropriate for the diverse patient groups. "Having access to nutritious food and suitable alternative nutritional therapies when appetite is poor, is one of the basic human rights anyone should expect. "This becomes all the more important when talking about this in relation to illness, disease and hospital settings where poor nutrition can affect patient well-being, hamper recovery, prolong infections and delay discharge. "Sadly patients are still denied access to individual advice as a result of lack of resources and low numbers of dietitians employed in the hospital and community sector. "With a limited number of dietitians working to fulfil the needs of the entire UK population patients are unable to receive the education and information that would empower them to improve and self manage their nutrition in the long term." The BDA has a Food Counts specialist group to promote good nutrition through food and beverage provision in health and community care settings. Vice chairman of the BDA's Food Counts group, Eileen Steinbock, added: "Our main objective is to improve the nutritional quality of food in hospitals and care settings. "Dietitians from the group, supported by hospital caterers and other stakeholders have worked over the last year to produce the 'Nutrition and Hydration Digest: Improving Outcomes through Food and Beverage Services'. "This is a credible evidence-based document that supports dietitians and caterers. A source of standards, guidance and good practice it also contains tools and checklists for measuring against these recognised standards. "These standards need to be met and budgets should be set to enable the catering service in hospitals to do so. All dietitians will welcome this when it is published in the near future and this will help to ensure patients receive food of the nutritional quality needed for recovery."