There are some medical arguments for the trend — private rooms, for example, could lower infection rates and allow patients more rest as they heal. But the main reason for the largess is marketing.

In a highly competitive field, patients — sometimes now referred to as “guests” — appreciate amenities. The tactic works. “We found that patient demand correlates much better to amenities than quality of care,” said Dr. John Romley, a research professor at the Leonard D. Schaeffer Center for Health Policy and Economics of the University of Southern California, who has studied the trend. That means that hospitals can improve their bottom line and their reputation by focusing more on hospitality than health care — offering organic food by a celebrity chef rather than lowering medication errors, for example.

As a result, American hospitals are looking less and less like their more utilitarian counterparts in Europe, where the average hospital charges per day are often less than a quarter of those in the United States, according to the International Federation of Health Plans.

The Henry Ford health system in Michigan caused a stir after it hired a hotel industry executive, Gerard van Grinsven of the Ritz-Carlton Group, in 2006 to run its new hospital, Henry Ford West Bloomfield. He had opened 20 hotels and his “focus on people and service excellence” has helped the hospital thrive in a competitive market, said Nancy M. Schlichting, Henry Ford’s chief executive, who decided to hire him. The idea was to take care of patients’ needs, she said, clinical and otherwise.

While no one is getting nostalgic for traditional hospital food, open wards or revealing gowns, some worry that hospitals are going too far with the creature comforts. They are particularly concerned since most hospitals are nonprofit, so construction — directly or indirectly — is subsidized with public money.