Following UK Allergy Awareness Week, leading meals provider, apetito, has commissioned a study which shows that 28% of care home residents have specialist nutrition needs.

The same survey found that 90% of care homes have individual nutritional plans put in place to help ensure residents receive the necessary nutrition and combat malnutrition.

And the statistics show that about 1 in three adults of the UK population suffer from an allergic reaction and it’s a figure that’s growing. For these people, their condition can be frightening, restrictive and places a very real burden on their everyday life and it’s important that care homes are aware of the implications and have individual meal programmes in place to meet resident needs.

Richard Woodward, General Manager for apetito Care Homes division says:

“It’s undeniable that good nutrition and hydration play a critical role in the health and wellbeing of care home residents and ensuring that residents who need free-from meals (the 14 known allergens), are catered for.

“There’s no question that every care home wants to deliver an excellent dining experience to every single one of its residents. Mealtimes are all about ensuring a personalised, enjoyable, and nutritionally based pathway and that should be no different for residents with specialist nutrition needs.

“With an estimated 408,000 care home residents in the UK [1], there are a lot of different dietary needs care homes need to cater for. Being that residents in care homes are some of the most vulnerable in society, awareness campaigns like UK Allergy Awareness Week serve as a salient reminder to all care homes about the importance of being vigilant at every turn when catering for residents with allergies.”

Discover more about how apetito can help Care Homes cater for specialist nutrition needs: apetito.link/specialdiets

References

[1] Munson, S. (2022) Care home stats: number of settings, population & workforce, carehome.co.uk. (Accessed: 10 May 2023). Available at: https://www.carehome.co.uk/advice/care-home-stats-number-of-settings-population-workforce