FAIRFIELD Hospital's new accident and emergency department has been criticised as being "no place for a child".

One parent told of her "anger, concern and frustration" after taking her two-year-old daughter to casualty at the Rochdale Old Road complex in the early hours.

The woman, who wishes to remain anonymous, said: "For parents who have never had to visit at this sort of time, let me tell you it is no place for a child.

"To get through the entrance, we had to pass by two drunks, one with a heavily bandaged head and face. All round the department's waiting area and in the cubicles were drunks behaving in ways which were totally incomprehensible to children."

Before the closure of Bury General, which used to house the borough's accident and emergency department, young children had their own emergency unit at Fairfield Hospital.

Now it has been incorporated into a new accident and emergency department, which health bosses say is a more satisfactory method of running a casualty unit, as all emergency staff are in one department. But the mother said: "I did not for one minute think that I would have to be seen in accident and emergency, as I had previously attended the children's medical emergency department."

Describing her experiences as "frightening", the parent said her child was directed to the children's cubicles which were occupied and they than "spent another four uncomfortable hours" waiting to be seen.

She added: "A whole department has been withdrawn quietly and without public knowledge, and has been replaced with two cubicles. I believe the hospital management have avoided publicly announcing the withdrawal of the the very valued children's medical emergency department because it has been done against the wishes of the paediatric staff."

However, Mr Philip Bacon, chief executive of Bury Health Care NHS Trust, said the old system of having a main casualty unit and a separate one for children was unsatisfactory.

He told the Bury Times: "The concerns of parents are of importance to us. But the hospital's accident and emergency unit is no different from that of other hospitals and we do have a children's medical emergency unit. It is only that it is now a part of the whole A & E department. The unit still has a play area and waiting area with its own nurses and doctors."

He said security is always being reviewed and that incidents hospitals have with unruly people are a "sad reflection" on society.