A TEAM of surgeons is being flown in from South Africa in a bid to slash East Lancashire's hip operation waiting list.

Thirty patients on the waiting list at Burnley General Hospital and 20 from Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley will be given the opportunity of early surgery as part of the £2million project.

In all, 300 patients from the North West will be operated on at Southport and Formby District Hospital in a purpose-built theatre between June and September this year.

The Government is funding the project directly to keep waiting times down and to relieve the pressure on local hospitals where there are shortages in suitably qualified NHS staff.

The medical team recruited from South Africa is from private contractors Netcare, which performed 800 cataract operations to clear a backlog in Morecambe Bay last year.

This initiative is the first overseas project to involve major joint surgery in Lancashire. Acting chief executive of Blackburn, Hyndburn and Ribble Valley Healthcare Trust John Dell said: "The trust has maintained its target that patients should wait no longer than 12 months for surgery.

"Currently the maximum waiting time for orthopaedics, including hip replacements, is 12 months. This initiative will help maintain that target and enable us to offer a choice to those patients who have been waiting longest as to whether they wish to take this opportunity."

Chief executive of Burnley Healthcare Trust David Chew said: "Although we are making good progress locally we feel that this initiative will be very helpful in supporting the push to reduce waiting times for patients requiring this type of surgery."

A spokeswoman for the trust said there are no specific waiting time statistics for routine orthopaedic procedures because they are dependent on clinical priorities but there were no patients currently waiting longer than 12 months.

Patients will be chosen for the scheme according to their length of time spent waiting, ability to cope with the journey to Southport and the quality of support they will receive within their own communities.

They can turn down the offer and still opt surgery at their own hospital and keep their place on its waiting list.

The South African team will provide follow up care for 12 months and fly back to carry out six-week check-ups, and a follow-up appointment at around 12 months. If there are any post-operative complications within that time, the GP will refer the patient to their local hospital, who will, in turn, contact the overseas clinicians.

Chief executive of Cumbria and Lancashire Strategic Health Authority, which oversees all NHS trusts in East Lancashire, Pearse Butler said: "We simply don't have enough staff."