Average hospital dietary expenses

Hospital food and nutrition services provide a vital component of patient recovery, while also ensuring specific dietary requirements are met and maintained.

In the Definitive Healthcare HospitalView product, we track hospital dietary expenses, which are the costs of preparing meals for patients. For this Healthcare Insight, we review average hospital dietary expenses and compare the results by bed size and location. Data is sourced from the Medicare Cost Report and aggregated from the last five calendar years of hospital financial performance tracked in our database.

What is the average hospital dietary expense?

Based on data from more than 5,000 hospitals in the Definitive Healthcare HospitalView product, the average annual hospital dietary expenses for U.S. hospitals is more than $2.3 million. The total amount spent across U.S. hospitals for dietary expenses was nearly $13 billion in 2021, the most recent full year of data available.

Average dietary expenses at U.S. hospitals

Fig. 1 Data is from the Definitive Healthcare HospitalView product and sourced from Medicare Cost Report. Accessed June 2023.

How much do hospital dietary expenses increase each year?

Costs associated with hospital foodservice and dietary expenses increased by 3.5% on average from 2017 to 2021. In comparison, total hospital operating expenses increase by about 5% each year.

What is the average hospital food cost per patient day?

We compared hospital dietary expenses and total acute days (a hospital sizing metric that counts the number of days that patients receive inpatient care) to understand an approximate food cost for patients at a hospital.  Based on our data for more than 5,000 hospitals that reported both metrics, we calculated an average hospital food cost per patient day of about $268.

Average dietary expenses by hospital bed size

Fig. 2 Data is from the Definitive Healthcare HospitalView product and sourced from Medicare Cost Report. Accessed June 2023.

Hospitals with more than 250 beds have the highest average dietary expenses at nearly $7.8 million. The high number of hospital beds means these hospitals have more patients to feed on a daily basis.

Average hospital dietary expense by region

Fig. 3 Data is from the Definitive Healthcare HospitalView product and sourced from Medicare Cost Report. Accessed June 2023.

Average dietary expenses are highest for hospitals in the Northeast at more than $3.6 million. A number of hospitals with the overall highest dietary expenses as well as several of the hospitals with the highest operating expenses in the country are in the northeastern U.S. This region also has higher operating expenses compared to other regions including higher average salary expenses and IT expenses.

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Healthcare Insights are developed with healthcare commercial intelligence from the Definitive Healthcare platform. Want even more insights? Start a free trial now and get access to the latest healthcare commercial intelligence on hospitals, physicians, and other healthcare providers.