Diet satisfaction and associated factors among adult surgical orthopaedic inpatients at a teaching hospital in Lusaka province, Zambia; a hospital-based cross-sectional study

BACKGROUND: Poor quality of food services in hospital contributes to low diet satisfaction among inpatients in both developed and developing countries. However, there is paucity of literature on diet satisfaction in health care facilities in the sub-Saharan region and in particular Zambia. Therefore, this study sought to assess levels of diet satisfaction among adult surgical orthopaedic inpatients at a teaching hospital in Lusaka province, Zambia. METHODS: -value of less than 0.05 was considered to be statistically significant. RESULTS: > 0.05). CONCLUSION: Low diet satisfaction is a global problem associated with poor quality of hospital meals. Although the majority of surgical orthopaedic inpatients were not satisfied with more than half of the dimensions of diet satisfaction, they were satisfied with aspects of portion size, temperature and time of meal distribution. Therefore, an assessment of diet satisfaction can inform hospital administrators and policy makers on the deficiencies in hospital diets and thereby help improve quality of meals.