Costing Foodservices in Aged Care Is More Than Food Alone: The Development of the FCT

Foodservices in residential aged-care homes (RACHs) play a vital role in providing meals and maintaining residents’ health through good nutrition. However, foodservices are often required to work within a budget, and the costs involved in foodservices are often misunderstood and underestimated. The aim of this work was to design a costing tool that included all relevant costs of a foodservice. A systems approach was used to inform the development of the Foodservice Costing Tool (FCT). Eight domains were identified, including costs that are both directly and indirectly associated with foodservices. The tool was piloted and trialled in the Australian aged-care setting and compared to currently available national estimates of costs. Through four pilots and subsequent trials, the FCT was able to capture the costs of a foodservice system in a small sample of RACHs, although the low response rate may have biased the sample toward those homes that had fewer problems with the FCT. The results highlighted the limitations of currently reported estimates, which underestimate total costs, as they fail to encompass the complexity of foodservices and to recognise that costs extend beyond the kitchen. The FCT is a useful tool and has the potential to be used by RACHs to both measure and understand their costs at a more granular level to ensure cost effectiveness and accountability. Further research is required to validate the tool and investigate the implementation of the FCT on a larger scale.