Room Service Hits High Marks
OVER ONE YEAR LATER, THE BELLEVUE HOSPITAL’S
ROOM SERVICE INCREASES IN POPULARITY
August 28, 2004 --
Nearly 18 months after implementation of a new
room service food ordering system, The Bellevue Hospital
(TBH) continues to see the popularity of the project grow in
terms of patient satisfaction, cost savings, and from
hospitals across the country interested in patterning their
own food service program after TBH’s.
“We went live with the new room service ordering system on
Feb. 17, 2003,” explains Dennis Gnage, Dietary Manager at
TBH. “And since that time, we have seen our patient
satisfaction scores continue to rise.
“In fact, prior to implementation of the program, patient
satisfaction scores concerning room service were hovering
around the 70-75th percentile, with a low of around the 55th
percentile. Today, 18 months later, Press Ganey patient
satisfaction scores for our food service are ranked out of
the 99th percentile. What this means is out of the other
1,118 hospitals in the United States we are compared with,
we scored higher than 99% of all the other hospitals.
“The system is living up to what it was expected to do -
deliver a variety of hot, fresh food when the patient wants
it,” continued Gnage. “With this system, the patient can
order what they want, when they want it, anytime between the
hours of 7:30 a.m. and 6:30 p.m. daily.”
Under the old system, patients were limited to daily menu
items and were limited to eating during certain blocks of
time for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Often, those times
interfered with medical testing or were simply not
convenient for the patient being ready to eat.
With the new system, patients can order breakfast anytime
during the day, with the lunch menu beginning at 11 a.m. and
the dinner menu beginning at 4 p.m. daily. The menu also
lists “healthy food choices” and lists the amount of carbs
in each menu selection.
“There were no hospitals in this area using this concept
when we started our room service,” added Gnage. “I believe
the closest hospital was in Cleveland. Since implementing
the program, I have had contacts from local hospitals in
Fostoria, Norwalk, Fremont, and Henry County, and hospitals
across the nation including Texas, North Carolina,
Pennsylvania, and Kansas, all wanting information on how we
began our program. These other hospitals are learning about
our program from newspaper articles, word-of-mouth and from
our website.
We have set up site visits so officials from these other
hospitals can come in and find out how we are offering our
room service so they can pattern their own program after
ours.”
Fremont’s Bonnie Ragusa, a recent patient at TBH, gives high
marks to the room service system.
“I had not seen anything
like it at any other hospital until I got here,” explained Ragusa.
“I like it a lot. You don’t waste any food this way
and it is a lot better than the old system with the
paper menu where you were given a couple of choices
and had to pick your menu items a day ahead of time. I
really like it this way, and besides that, the food is
good!”
In addition to the rise in patient satisfaction scores,
Gnage noted that two other benefits to the new system are an
overall food cost savings of around 10%, and less food being
thrown out in the garbage. “Patients order what they want,
so they are eating what they order.”
And, the menu itself was recently awarded a Gold Medal for
in-house publications during the recent National Healthcare
Marketing Awards competition.
“We will continue to evaluate our program in order to
improve our customer service,” said Gnage. “Right now, we
are looking at changing some of the menu items and updating
the china service we use to serve the food to patients.”
