HEART attack victims in East Lancashire could have a better chance of survival thanks to a £6million scheme to install life-saving equipment in busy town centres.

Lancashire's Ambulance Service NHS Trust has been invited to apply to the British Heart Foundation for community defibrillators being paid for by lottery cash.

It is one of four trusts in the North West to have been invited to bid for a share of the cash pot.

The defibrillators could be placed in town centres where staff will be trained how to use them to administer mild electric shocks to heart attack victims, helping to restore a normal heartbeat.

The trust is yet to announce its bid but is expected to apply for equipment in centres including Blackburn, Burnley and Accrington.

Funding from lottery cash distributor the New Opportunities Commission will provide 2,300 defibrillators nationwide and a community defibrillator officer for every NHS ambulance trust, including Lancashire.

The officers will be fully trained in how to use the equipment and administer emergency life support.

They will pass on that vital training to ensure that emergency treatment is administered within four minutes of a person having a cardiac arrest.

David Hill, chief executive of Lancashire Ambulance Service NHS Trust, said: "This is a welcome boost to our campaign to reduce deaths from heart attacks in Lancashire. We already have in place more than 20 teams of volunteer Community First Responders, who operate mainly in the rural areas of the county. We shall be applying to the new scheme to place defibrillators in all Lancashire's main town and city shopping centres and bus stations, where people most at risk of cardiac arrest will benefit.

"It is really good news that the funding will pay for a community defibrillator officer, whose role will be to increase the number of people in Lancashire trained to use the equipment and in the vital skills of emergency life support."

The Department of Health's NHS plan for England includes a target of 3,000 defibrillators in public places by 2003. At present the government has installed 700 -- this investment will bring the total to 3,000.