Hospital Food and Hospital Malnutrition: What Plate-Waste Audits Reveal About Ward-Level Nutrition Care
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.22275692Keywords:
Plate waste, Hospital malnutrition, Food service, Mealtime care, Nutritional intakeAbstract
Across 32 hospital studies the median plate waste is 30 per cent by weight, with a range from 6 to 65 per cent, far above other food
service settings. That aggregate figure conceals the finding that matters. In a ward service evaluation, plate waste at main meals
was 4.1 per cent among patients assessed as nutritionally well and 53.1 per cent among those assessed as nutritionally vulnerable,
with daily intakes of 1,592 and 643 kcal respectively. The waste is concentrated in precisely the patients for whom the food is
treatment. Provision is not the constraint: in a survey of 1,707 hospitalised patients, meals supplied energy exceeding requirement
by 41 per cent and protein by 15 per cent, yet 975 patients did not eat enough and the intake of 572 of them, 59 per cent, was not
predominantly affected by disease. Plate waste audits therefore measure ward-level nutrition care rather than catering
performance.
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