"Catering services"

I recently had an operation at Albany Hospital. I was supposed to be admitted for 3 nights, however, I only ended up being there 2 nights. Firstly, I must say that everything in regards to the care and staff was excellent and could not be faulted.

On the first evening, as it was my first day admitted, I was not able to choose what food I would get, and therefore ended up with the default meal. On the next day, however, I was able to choose. It seems as though it takes a long time for your order to get through the pipeline and in the end,  unfortunately, I did not get what I ordered.

The meals I did get during my stay were terrible. I found them to be bland; the dairy in them was always low-fat, and meals contained little to no salt at all. I can understand these decisions from a health standpoint, but perhaps you could at least offer salt sachets and other condiments to allow the person to choose to add them if they want to have these.

Also, the meals I did receive were absolutely enormous. This may have been less of an issue if they were good, and I wanted to eat it all, however, I imagine that there is likely a lot of food waste, which I find terrible considering the environmental impact.

I have spoken to another patient that had the same operation as me a number of weeks earlier, and they shared my concerns around the food. They also stated that they requested a 'small' portion meal, and when they got it it was excessively small. Surely there is a middle ground?

As I stated at the beginning, the care I received and the staff I encountered were excellent. In the end, it was probably a good thing that the food was so bad - I only ended up lasting 2 nights instead of 3 and was home sooner.