Hospital Food and Meal Service

The World Health Organization, Swedish law and governing documents and guidelines state that healthcare, including nutritional care, should be high quality, patient safe, integrated, person-centred and sustainable. Food and meals for hospitalised patients are part of nutritional care and are thus subject to these complex requirements, as clarified in the Swedish National Food Agency's national guidelines for hospital meals.

There are a variety of symptoms, diseases and conditions that are treated in the healthcare system where food and meals are often an effective support to the medical treatment, sometimes the single most important treatment. At the same time, food and meals in hospitals have long been criticised in terms of, for example, nutritional content and palatability, and lack of adaptation to the needs of different patients and patient groups. Furthermore, the criticism has concerned both the organisation and competence of the healthcare system regarding nutritional care and the food served as well as the meal situation.

This criticism has led to many forms of improvement work being carried out both in Sweden and internationally. However, there is considerable lack of knowledge about what kind of improvement work is done, how it is done and what it means for each organisation. Above all, there is a lack of research in the area, not least in relation to Swedish conditions. The overall purpose of this research project is therefore to increase insight into the organisation of food and meals for inpatients in hospitals with a focus on quality, improvement work and implementation.