ICY conditions and school holidays have combined to see a record number of patients with broken bones heading for A & E departments in Blackburn and Burnley.

Casualty staff at Blackburn Royal Infirmary and Burnley General Hospital have been struggling to cope.

There has been with a dramatic rise in the numbers of fractures to wrists and ankles, as well as broken arms and legs since the cold snap saw ice and snow cover pavements and roads across East Lancashire.

Temperatures have fallen as low as minus seven at night in the last week and snow and ice has been unable to melt as daytime maximum temperatures struggled to rise above freezing.

The fracture clinic in outpatients at Burnley saw 24 broken bones in the space of three days after New Year, when it would normally see between 12 and 15.

Ojne day this week staff at the A & E department at Blackburn Royal Infirmary dealt with 50 fracture cases when it would normally expect to see around 20.

Although no statistics were available for the numbers of attendances overall, staff at Burnley reported a significant rise in numbers compared with the same period last year.

Burnley A & E nurse manager Duncan Bladon said: "We have had dozens of broken bones and have also seen large numbers of people coming in with sledging injuries, such as nasty bruises and broken arms.

"We have also treated a number of children with minor head injuries.

"I think it is partly just people out sledging with their children."

But Mr Bladon said there had not been the large numbers of flu patients as predicted by authorities.

"I don't think the flu has really kicked in yet. This time last year we had a lot of flu patients, but this year has not been so bad. I believe the uptake for flu jabs was quite high, which may have helped."

A & E consultant at Blackburn Habib Dardouri admitted staff had been straining to cope with so many cases in such a short space of time.

"We have been struggling a bit with 50 fracture cases in one day, of mostly patients who could not be sent home.

"Unfortunately, you cannot predict this type of thing and sometimes you try your best, but you need more staff for patients.

"There are times when things have been stressful, both for patients and staff, but I think people have to understand that fact when they come to A & E."

He said most of the fractures involved elderly women and he expected more victims to come in over the next few days, as they realised they had fractured bones.

He said the department had also dealt with more injuries from road accidents, due to the poor conditions.