Though pricey bills are another strong contender, hospital food is the number one complaint from patients and their families during a hospital stay. The meals that are presumably scientifically designed to be low fat, low sodium and necessary for a healthy recovery are also low in flavor and overall appeal. Some medical experts say that, perhaps as a result of cost-cutting over the past two decades, some hospitals make only a minimal attempt to make their food palatable. Instead of generating meals to the specific dietary needs of patients, one meal that is bland and basic enough to serve to the majority of people is provided.

But not for long.

Instead of serving the same lukewarm rice pilaf at hospitals around the globe, George Blackburn, an associate professor of surgery and nutrition at the Harvard Medical School, has begun to publicize the fact that good tasting, culturally correct food is what will really make people feel better. Because loss of appetite is a symptom of sickness, food was considered to be necessary but not terribly important at some hospitals, but now doctors and nutritionists are hoping that restoring appetite may aid in their recovery, not only returning once the patient is out of the hospital.

According to the New York Times, more and more hospitals are renewing their emphasis on nutrition and a producing a feeling of well-being in their patients, not just mechanically churning out food according to the number or calories and grams of sodium on the plate. Some hospitals are offering ethnic foods that appeal to a culturally diverse group of patients. The Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan actually offers an extensive menu from which patients can order and the vice president of the American Hospital Association says that nearly 40% of the 4,800 hospitals in the association plan to change to similar formats by 2011. The Alaska Native Medical Center in Anchorage already serves native foods like caribou stew, boiled fish and berries and the Chinese Hospital in San Francisco serves egg noodles with steamed fish dumplings and bitter melon soup.