PATIENTS across East Lancashire are being warned they could be left without support and advice for six months when community health councils are abolished.

Staff in East Lancashire CHCs are worried about a 'black hole' between their axing in September and the setting up of their replacement bodies, Patient Forums, which will be fully up-and-running by April 2004.

East Lancashire MPs today said they shared the concerns of the CHCs and they would be lobbying the Government to postpone the abolition.

Blackburn and Burnley CHCs currently have 60 cases on their books and Burnley's chief officer Helen Gee, said she has no idea what will happen to them when the CHC staff are made redundant in September. She said: "The Government has reneged on its promise that CHCs would not be abolished until it was certain all their functions would be taken up by the new bodies. This handover is not going to happen and there will be a gap.

"CHC staff in East Lancashire currently have a caseload of about 60 where we are giving individual advice and support to clients. Who will take over these cases when our offices are closed down in September?"

She said the six staff employed in East Lancashire will receive redundancy notices in June, with no guarantees of jobs after September.

Patient Forums will formally come into being in April 2004 and will monitor and review the services provided by health trusts, seek the views of patients and make reports and recommendations to the Trust management. A total of seven will be set up to cover the seven trusts which will operate in East Lancashire.

Other parts of the CHC role will be taken over by Patient Advice and Liaison Services (PALS) which offer advice on access to health services.

Local councils which provide social services, Lancashire County Council and Blackburn with Darwen Council, are also being given wider scrutiny roles. Both have set up health scrutiny committees which are still very much in their infancy.

Shadow Patient Forums have been set up for the hospital trusts in Burnley and Blackburn and there are PALS offices in both towns but neither body has the same wide remit as a CHC. A pilot independent complaints service has been established, but it is not ready to handle complaints yet.

Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans said: "I'm deeply perturbed by this and was totally opposed to the abolition of CHCs in the first place -- they should've been kept as they have in Wales. Any gap which creates a vacuum between CHCs and their successor bodies should be rectified and the life of CHCs extended."

Hyndburn MP Greg Pope, said: "I share the CHCs' concerns and have already written to Health Secretary Alan Milburn expressing those concerns about the six-month gap. It seems to me the most logical thing to do would be to postpone the abolition until the new bodies are up and running and I will put this to ministers."

Burnley MP Peter Pike, said: "I share the concerns. We have a first class CHC in Burnley and its abolition should have been delayed until its successor is properly up and running."

The Government says the new system will increase public involvement in health issues by such methods as encouraging Patients Forums to use modern approaches to meetings to generate as much interest as possible.