FOOD being served up at Russells Hall Hospital has improved in the last 12 months, according to figures from the Department of Health.

The food was recently tried and rated by a team from the Patient Led Assessment of the Care Environment (PLACE).

Factors they considered included how well the food was served, whether the ward was prepared for mealtimes and if unnecessary activity was stopped during the meals.

The Dudley hospital received an 84.97 per cent satisfaction rating for the quality of food.

Choice of food on offer, was rated at 82.26 per cent, which took into consideration provisions for patients with special dietary needs.

The cost of food service - which also takes into consideration staffing costs and transport - was given as £10.38 per patient per day and assessors saw patients had access to fresh fruit, snacks between meals and that the menu was checked by a dietician.

Overall the hospital was given a 84.28 per cent satisfaction rating for its food service, compared to 78.36 per cent last year.

Paula Clark, chief executive of the Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust, said she was "delighted" with the findings.

She said: "We are pleased to see a significant improvement in our score for food and hydration and are sure that in 2015 we will increase this score further with the introduction of a new menu chosen by patients.

"As part of our commitment to improve food for patients we have been asking patients which dishes they have liked best, which they liked least and what else they might have liked to have seen on the menu.

"Using this information our dietitians have compiled a new menu that we are testing on three of our wards during September.

"During this time we are continuing to ask patients and staff for their opinions of the food to help us fine-tune and create a final menu to be rolled out to all wards across the hospital."