{"id":147198,"date":"2018-06-27T11:39:00","date_gmt":"2018-06-27T11:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/patients-choked-on-hospital-soft-food\/"},"modified":"2018-06-27T11:39:00","modified_gmt":"2018-06-27T11:39:00","slug":"patients-choked-on-hospital-soft-food","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/english\/patients-choked-on-hospital-soft-food\/","title":{"rendered":"Patients &#8216;choked on hospital soft food&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure>                                  <img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Hash browns\" src=\"https:\/\/ichef.bbci.co.uk\/news\/320\/cpsprodpb\/661E\/production\/_102224162_gettyimages-466481889.jpg\"\/>Image copyright                  Getty Images<figcaption>Image caption                                      Patients with swallowing difficulties were reportedly given hash browns to eat                              <\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p class=\"caps\">Two patients are reported to have died and seven more came to &quot;significant harm&quot; after people with swallowing difficulties were given inappropriate food, according to NHS Improvement.<\/p>\n<p>The regulator received reports of hash browns, mince and sponge cake being fed to patients in England who were supposed to be on liquidised food.<\/p>\n<p>Hundreds of choking or coughing incidents also occurred from 2015-17.<\/p>\n<p>Experts are now calling for an end to the term &quot;soft diet&quot;.<\/p>\n<p>NHS Improvement, the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists and the British Dietetic Association say the term can cause confusion among staff, patients and carers.<\/p>\n<h2>&#039;Avoid further harm&#039;<\/h2>\n<p>Dr Kathy McLean, executive medical director at NHS Improvement, said: &quot;Vulnerable patients have died or been harmed because there is confusion in the way people describe what type of food is suitable for those with swallowing or chewing difficulties.<\/p>\n<p>&quot;We are calling on everyone providing NHS-funded care to start using precise terminology to help avoid further harm. <\/p>\n<p>&quot;This will help save lives and make the NHS safer,&quot; she said.<\/p>\n<p>Patients who have swallowing difficulties, known as dysphagia, or difficulty chewing need food which is soft, minced, pureed or liquidised.<\/p>\n<p>Some people with the condition can&#039;t swallow at all and some have problems swallowing certain foods or liquids.<\/p>\n<p>It can affect people of all ages and is often caused by another health condition such as stroke, head injury, multiple sclerosis or dementia.<\/p>\n<p>NHS Improvement now wants all NHS staff to use clearly categorised food textures - as published by the International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative - to make sure patients are fed safely and correctly according to their individual needs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Image copyright Getty ImagesImage caption Patients with swallowing difficulties were reportedly given hash browns to eat Two patients are reported to have died and seven more came to &quot;significant harm&quot;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":147199,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-147198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-english"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147198\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/147199"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/freeonlinetranslators.net\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}