Free Meals for Parents in Hospitals

Paying for food while your child is in hospital can be extremely costly. It can also mean that parents must leave children on the ward whilst they go to local shops to find and purchase food.

Sophie’s Legacy are encouraging all hospitals to provide meals for parents. This ensures that no parent goes without proper nutrition during the stressful experience of supporting their child in hospital.

This article will explain what the food provision scheme is and which hospitals it is currently operating in.

Importantly, if your local hospital does not currently provide food to parents, you can contact Charlotte Fairall at [email protected] for more information about getting this initiative set up in your hospital.

Sophie’s Story

Sophie’s Legacy was created in memorial of Sophie Fairall and the legacy of change she wanted to create.

Sophie had just turned 9 when she was diagnosed with a rare form of childhood cancer called Rhabdomyosarcoma in September 2020. She underwent intensive treatment, which was spread over 3 hospitals. In every hospital, Sophie noticed the same problems: parents weren’t being fed, the children’s food was inadequate and would be given at inappropriate times; and the play facilities for children weren’t always open.

Sophie never managed to get into remission and in June 2021, after only eight weeks on a programme of maintenance chemotherapy, she relapsed. When this happened, the doctors informed Sophie and her family that curing her was no longer possible and her treatment would now be palliative care. Sophie tried one round of palliative chemo, but it didn’t work so Sophie, together with her family, decided to stop all treatment in July 2021. She understood what this meant but wanted to spend the time she had left at home with her family.

Sophie set out writing her bucket list and, despite the pain and discomfort, was able to achieve some incredible experiences through grit and determination. She also wanted to change a number of things nationally and created a bucket list for her mother, Charlotte, to achieve in her memory. One of these wishes was for parents to be fed in every hospital across the country. Sophie was able to think of others despite knowing that she would never get to see any of the things that she wanted changed.

Sophie sadly passed away aged 10, in September 2021, just 1 year after her diagnosis. Since 2021, Sophie’s Legacy has been campaigning tirelessly to achieve Sophie’s wishes and improve the experience of children and families facing hospital admissions.

You can read more about Sophie’s story here.

Why is feeding parents in hospitals important?

This scheme has a significant positive impact on both the whole family and the child being treated. Some of these advantages include:

Take a look at some parents’ feedback about how being offered meals while their child was in hospital has helped them:

What provision is available?

The provision available depends on the hospital. Here are some types of provision that may be available:

• Meal vouchers.
• Frozen meals.
• Electronic online meal ordering system.
• Hot lunch/ sandwiches and fruit at teatime.
• Soup/ rolls.
• Feeding parents off the trolley.

There is a wide variation in the offer across trusts. However, feeding parents at ward level is seen as the gold standard, because it allows the parent to stay with the child. Some trusts may offer multiple options of provision.

Am I eligible?

If your hospital is offering food provision to parents, then any parent staying overnight with their child is entitled to be fed. The scheme is not means tested.

Normally, this will just apply to just one parent, but this is up to the trust.

If your hospital is feeding parents, then they should be advertising this. Someone should approach you while you are on the ward or when you attend hospital with your child to tell you what provision is available. However, you can also ask your hospital if they are providing food to parents.

Hospitals involved

Here is a list of hospitals that are feeding parents. Please note, provision in hospitals may stop or change.

Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (HHFT) was not involved in any of the pilot schemes and did not receive any funding. However, after hearing Charlotte Fairall speak in 2023, they decided that providing free parent meals was the right thing to do. They funded this food provision by reducing food waste in three hospitals. Basingstoke and North Hampshire Hospital estimated that they saved £112,791.09 annually through the food reduction. They reported that they did not see a rise in costs from feeding parents and that targeting a reduction in food waste paid for this service.

If you aren’t being fed in hospital, please reach out to Charlotte Fairall at [email protected].

More work by Sophie’s Legacy

In addition to feeding parents in hospital, Sophie had 4 other wishes on her bucket list. These are:

• Play specialist 7 days a week in hospitals
• Improvements to food for children in hospital
• Heath professional to be trained in childhood cancer
• To increase funding childhood cancer research

For more information on the brilliant work that Sophie’s Legacy is doing, please visit their website here.

The information in this article was correct at time of publication, but may be subject to change. 

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