From plough to plate – an NHS first?

The resulting report, however, also commended a number of healthcare organisations which had put considerable time, effort, and commitment, into providing first-class patient meals, often at negligible extra cost, and using high quality, locally sourced produce. One NHS Trust pioneering such an approach, while simultaneously boosting the fortunes of local farmers and other food producers, is Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust, which, HEJ editor Jonathan Baillie discovered, is now not only being held up as a national exemplar of good NHS catering practice, but has also recently had the go-ahead for a new £2.2 million catering facility.

One of a number of healthcare organisations praised for both the quality of its food, and its sustainable sourcing, in the recent Soil Association survey report, First Aid for Hospital Food (see HEJ – September 2011) Sussex Partnership NHS Foundation Trust currently produces, or “home cooks”, as head of catering William McCartney feels is a more apt description, a range of appetising, nutritionally balanced meals for patients located at 12 mental healthcare facilities in an area spanning from St Leonards on Sea in the east, to Crawley and Haywards Heath in the north and west. The meals are produced at the Trust’s Amberstone central production unit (CPU) just outside Hailsham. While both the high standard of meals, and the Trust’s policy of sourcing much of its fruit, vegetables, meat, and fish, locally, have been widely praised both by the Soil Association, and by patients, the buildings housing the catering operation at Amberstone are ageing, badly linked, cramped, and somewhat labyrinthine. Concluding that a number are no longer fit-for purpose, the Trust last year approved, to the team’s delight, plans for a new £2.2 million catering facility in Hailsham, which will provide significantly more space. The new facility, into which staff hope to move early next year, will not only enable meals to be produced more efficiently using new, hi-tech cooking equipment, but will also enable it to supply meals to a further 29 Trust inpatient locations within Sussex, including a number as far away as Chichester. William McCartney elaborated: “We currently cook and supply food to 27 sites at 12 different locations, but the new facility will see us considerably expand both our range of meals, and the number of locations we supply. Much of our food is cooked in dual temperature regeneration ovens at the various mental healthcare facilities, although one unit currently undertakes its own cooking from scratch. Being able to produce all our food at one site will ensure even more cost-effective meals, while also helping to improve patient care, and benefiting the environment, since we should be able to significantly reduce the miles travelled by our delivery vans.”

Aid to recovery