CRUMLIN COOKS IT FRESH

WHEN it comes to hospitals serving meals, the Children’s Hospital Group appears to have the secret formula for success.

Speaking to the Irish Mail on Sunday, Fiona Ward, dietitian manager at Our Lady’s Children’s Hospital in Crumlin, explained why a ‘cook fresh’ approach is the way forward.

She said: ‘The first thing to point out is that nutrition is very different for children than it is for adults. Obviously, a key thing is that they are still growing. Very often with children with a chronic illness, it increases their requirements. The requirements we see here in the hospital are very different to those in the general community.

‘We are very lucky here in Crumlin that we have a good and dedicated catering department. We have a “cook fresh” system, which you don’t often see in some of the adult facilities. So we have that capability to manipulate the food and fortify the food, and meet the nutritional requirements of children with very complicated medical conditions.’

She added: ‘Yes, in comparison to some of the adult facilities then we would spend more money [on food] for that reason, because we have to.

‘From a paediatric perspective, we have to be able to manipulate the food that patients get on a daily basis to be actually able to treat some of the illnesses that we are dealing with. If you can get nutrition right in childhood then in the longer term it works in adulthood too.’