No More Jell-O

Hospital Food Tastes Better, Thanks to Obamacare

Endangered.
Endangered. Photo: Courtesy JELL-O

Now that patient-satisfaction scores impact how much Medicare pays hospitals, food programs are getting better and better. It’s about damn time! This means that some patients can order food at all hours through hotel-style “room service,” buy vegetables from local farmers in hospital lobbies, and enjoy banana-nut pancakes and cured turkey pastrami. The University of North Carolina Health System, which offers a twenty-page menu that “looks like something you would see at the Cheesecake Factory,” attributes its high satisfaction rates to gourmet burritos and chicken panang. But delivering good, customizable food also saved the UNC hospital $400,000 in one year because the program reduces waste: Extra meals that aren’t served to patients go to the cafeteria. Regardless of your politics or position on Obamacare, everyone can unite to rally behind the end of mystery meat. [USAT]

Hospital Food Tastes Better, Thanks to Obamacare