Chatzipavlou Maria, Karayiannis Dimitrios, Chaloulakou Stavroula, Georgakopoulou Efthymia, Poulia Kalliopi Anna
Department of Clinical Nutrition, "Evangelismos" General Hospital of Athens, Ypsilantou 45-47, 10676, Athens, Greece.
Laboratory of Dietetics and Quality of Life, Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition, School of Food and Nutritional Sciences, Agricultural University of Athens, 75 Iera Odos, 11855 Athens, Greece.
Clin Nutr ESPEN. 2024 Jun;61:237-252. doi: 10.1016/j.clnesp.2024.03.030. Epub 2024 Apr 3.
Food waste is a pivotal contributor to environmental degradation in the modern world. Vast amounts of food are wasted and many individual efforts and collective initiatives being underway to deal with this challenge. Hospitals are institutions that produce and provide food, but at the same time contribute greatly to food waste. The objective of this scoping review is to present available data regarding quantity of food waste generated in public hospitals and summarizes studies that assess and quantify the greenhouse gas emissions (carbon footprint) associated to food service management in hospitals.
A systematic literature research was conducted by two qualified researchers in PubMed, Scopus, ISI Web of Science and Science Direct. The publication date was set to the last ten years, i.e., 2013-2023. All the abstracts retrieved were screened, and the eligible articles were selected after a two-step process. Abstracts from the retrieved full papers' references were also screened for eligibility. The selected papers were included in the final scoping review.
Overall, 2870 studies were identified and 69 were included in the review. Most of the studies (n = 33) assessed the causes and quantified the amount of food waste generated in hospitals. A small number of studies (5) estimated carbon dioxide equivalent (CO-eq) produced by food waste. Although several studies suggested strategies and measures to reduce the environmental impact of foodservice operations, none of them implemented a comprehensive foodservice management system.
This scoping review suggests that hospital diets contribute to food waste and may have a negative environmental impact. There are several internal and external factors and practices that influence positively or negatively the sustainability of hospital food service systems. Systematic efforts are needed to identify and enhance parameters that could improve the environmental footprint of hospitals in terms of more effective management of food waste.
食物浪费是现代世界环境退化的一个关键因素。大量食物被浪费，许多个人努力和集体倡议正在进行，以应对这一挑战。医院是生产和提供食物的机构，但同时也对食物浪费有很大贡献。本综述的目的是展示关于公立医院产生的食物浪费数量的现有数据，并总结评估和量化与医院食品服务管理相关的温室气体排放（碳足迹）的研究。
由两名合格的研究人员在PubMed、Scopus、ISI Web of Science和Science Direct上进行系统的文献研究。出版日期设定为过去十年，即2013 - 2023年。对检索到的所有摘要进行筛选，并经过两步过程选择符合条件的文章。还对检索到的全文参考文献中的摘要进行合格性筛选。选定的论文被纳入最终的综述。
总体而言，共识别出2870项研究，其中69项被纳入综述。大多数研究（n = 33）评估了医院食物浪费产生的原因并对其数量进行了量化。少数研究（5项）估计了食物浪费产生的二氧化碳当量（CO - eq）。尽管有几项研究提出了减少食品服务运营对环境影响的策略和措施，但没有一项实施了全面的食品服务管理系统。
本综述表明医院饮食会导致食物浪费，并可能对环境产生负面影响。有几个内部和外部因素及做法会对医院食品服务系统的可持续性产生积极或消极影响。需要进行系统的努力，以识别和加强那些能够通过更有效地管理食物浪费来改善医院环境足迹的参数。
