A menu is associated with a dining area, including a residence area enabled as a dining area for in-room service, via a menu service location (MSL). A menu service location can be thought of as the “connecting piece”: a menu is assigned to the menu service location and the dining area is assigned to the menu service location.
When a person is assigned to a dining area, the menus available to that person are via the menu service location that the dining area is assigned to.
A menu service location can support a menu of each menu type (i.e., standard, snack, special event, also available), but cannot support more than one menu of the same type (e.g., cannot support more than one standard menu, cannot support more than one snack menu).
By using more then one menu service location you have the flexibility of scheduling multiple menus of the same type at the same time. For example, a facility can have a standard menu served in its long-term care dining area (via “menu service location 1”), and another standard menu served in its residence dining area (via “menu service location 2”).
A menu can also be assigned to more than one menu service location.