£8.46 catering bill satisfies Trust

Rochdale Infirmary

The Pennine Acute Hospital Trust, which runs the Rochdale Infirmary, is spending just under £8.50 a day on breakfast, lunch and dinner.

Figures released by the NHS Information Centre show the Trust spend £8.46 to feed and water each patient per day.

The trust, which also runs hospitals in Oldham, Bury and North Manchester, dished up over 1,700,000 meals in 2010-2011.

Figures also show it had a 5 per cent food-wastage rate.

Pam Stansfield, head of catering at The Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “We provided 1.7 million meals across our five hospitals last year. The cost of meals at our hospitals within Pennine Acute Trust does vary due to the different food services systems in place.

“However, we believe that the Trust wide figures included in The NHS Information Centre statistics are in line with a large Trust such as ours in terms of food service and quality we aim to provide.

“Our catering service managers monitor food expenditure and food wastage and, importantly, patient satisfaction on a weekly basis and we also receive annual formal PEAT inspections which involve patients.

“Plans are drawn up and reviewed to address any areas of concern and we are constantly working to improve the food services for our patients wherever possible.

"We have an extensive menu which caters to meet the needs of all patient groups, and have significant patient representation when we are developing new menus.”

Across Greater Manchester, The Christie NHS Foundation Trust spent the most at £12.76 a day but had 10 per cent wastage.

The Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust, which runs mental health services, spent £9.32 and had almost 7 per cent wastage.

Other neighbouring trusts spent less — Tameside Hospital £7.37 a day, the Royal Bolton Hospital £5.66, and Salford Royal £5.09.

Across the country, Wiltshire Primary Care Trust spent the most at £22.31 — and University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust spent £17.46.

However, Western Sussex Hospitals NHS Trust spent just £2.57 — or 86 pence a meal — to feed and water each patient.

The Department of Health said the amount of money hospitals spend on food had gone up over the past five years, with the average at £6.53 per patient per day in 2005/06, compared with £8.58 in 2010/11.

Waste was also going down, from an average of 8.9 per cent in 2005/06 to 5.9 per cent in 2010/11.

Health Minister Simon Burns said: “The amount of money hospitals are spending on food has gone up over the past five years, and waste is going down, but this rise in the amount spent on food does not necessarily mean better food for patients.

“Many trusts have excellent food and are serving healthy, fresh meals to their patients while staying within budget.

“These trusts set a precedent for others to follow and the whole NHS should be learning from the best.”