NHS hospital to offer food parcels to patients at risk of malnutrition
What will be the conclusion of the DWP ‘job advisers’ when they see hospital patients leaving with these food boxes?
Let’s hope hospital staff are very discreet.
Emergency staff at a hospital are being asked to offer food boxes discreetly to patients they believe may benefit as they are discharged amid rising concerns among doctors of malnourishment.
Tameside hospital in Greater Manchester is also planning to open a permanent food bank collection centre inside the hospital next month to help the nutrition of both patients and locals in the area.
News of the move came after it was announced on Wednesday by the work and pensions secretary Iain Duncan Smith that job advisers have been posted in a food bank in Manchester as part of a trial set to be rolled out across the UK.
The number of people admitted to hospitals in England and Wales with malnutrition has risen dramatically, from 5,469 to 6,520 in the past year, according to the latest figures from the Health and Social Care Information Centre. The European Nutrition for Health Alliance (ENHA), meanwhile, has estimated that up to 40% of patients in the UK are malnourished on hospital admission and many go undiagnosed due to inadequate screening.
At Tameside hospital emergency food boxes will be made up for staff in A&E to hand out discreetly, in reusable carrier bags, to those patients they feel would benefit once they are discharged and allowed home.
Source: NHS hospital to offer food parcels to patients at risk of malnutrition | Society | The Guardian
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Perhaps The Trussel Charity might help the NHS by providing food for people in hospital….bet David Cameron hadn’t thought of that !
He’d love that, because then his government wouldn’t have to pay to provide hospital food and could make all the caterers and ancillary staff unemployed.
The problem is the processed food stuffs the Trussel Charity give out can be of low nutritional value. Indeed, extended periods on cheap processed foods creates malnutrition; people need to realise that obese people often suffer from malnutrition as the food they eat is of such a poor quality, they are ‘starved’ of required vitamins and minerals.
Meanwhile no one is asking why food bank use has risen 1,665% since 2010.
Queen Elizabeth hospital in Birmingham is on the right track by offering hospital land for growing food, planting orchards and holding a farmers’ market so people have access to good quality nutritious food.
That is if the land hasn’t been sold off to a private developer yet…
People are asking that question! They know the answer but they’re asking anyway because they want to keep it in front of the public.
Supplying food to people, with no home support of family, who would be going home after a spell in hospital should be automatic because it is unlikely that they would have any fresh food available at home.