PATIENTS are being forced to wait up to four years for appointments due to a serious shortage of health specialists in East Lancashire, it has been revealed.

People with mental health problems are being kept waiting almost four years for appointments due to a critical shortage of psychologists.

Children are waiting more than a year for help with speech problems and the elderly are waiting up to year for therapists to help them recover from illness and stay in their own homes in Blackburn, Hyndburn and the Ribble Valley.

In the Burnley, Pendle and Nelson areas, adults can wait more than three years for speech therapy, while children can wait more than 18 months, and waiting lists to see psychologists are more than two years long.

People with more severe problems are seen more quickly, the longest waits are for patients with depression and anxiety.

Nigel Robinson, of patient watchdog body the Community Health Council which released the Communicare figures for the first time, has labelled the waiting times appalling.

And Ribble Valley Tory MP Nigel Evans said the government was prioritising quick, minor procedures while turning its back on long term problems that affected the young and old.

But Burnley's Labour MP Peter Pike today said the government was being forced to deal with the effects of 18 years of Tory misrule.

Mr Robinson said: "It's a hidden problem but we should be screaming from the roof tops about it."

And he said he believed the problems were being made worse in Hyndburn and the Ribble Valley by the break-up of Communicare NHS Trust, which provides all non-hospital services in Blackburn, Hyndburn and the Ribble Valley.

It is to be completely replaced by new Primary Care Trusts over the next few years. Blackburn PCT was formed earlier this year.

He said: "They are losing senior staff and it's difficult to replace them without job security."

Mr Robinson said waiting lists for primary care services weren't tabulated by the Government so it was difficult to tell if East Lancashire was worse off then other areas, but there was a national shortage of trained therapists. He said: "For anyone a year's wait is a long time, but for a child waiting for speech therapy it's worse. It can have profound effects on them.

"It's no joke if someone needs a ramp for a wheelchair to get into their house to find they have got to wait weeks and weeks for an occupational therapist to come out and agree before they can even go onto a waiting list to be given one."

He added: "They are doing their best with the resources they have, but the service is bursting at the seams."

Sheila Maw, chairman of Communicare NHS Trust, said: "We are as concerned about this as the patients."

She said they had been given some extra funding but had struggled to recruit extra staff, especially occupational therapists and psychologists.

As well as a national shortage of staff, it was doubly difficult to convince people to come and live in East Lancashire, she said.

Liz Holt, director of clinical support services, said the Trust had managed to recruit an extra child psychologist and she expected the waiting lists to come down.

The Trust is also training district nurses to do some basic occupational therapy tasks.

David Meakin, director of finance for Burnley NHS Trust, said the Trust hadn't had any new money to tackle the problems for more than three years, despite repeatedly asking the Government for extra cash, and there wouldn't be any grants next year either.

He said: "All the new money we've been given is only for in-patient and day case surgery to bring waiting lists down in those areas."

He said waiting lists were prioritised and people with more severe problems were seen more quickly.

Dr Tom Phillips, vice-chairman of the local medical committee for East Lancashire, said the system was virtually unuseable.

Dr Phillips, a GP at Larkhill and Brownhill health centres, said: "The waiting times are so long it becomes unuseable. People don't turn up for appointments which wastes resources.

"If your appointment is six months away, it's easy to forget and people may no longer need the service."

Conservative Ribble Valley MP Nigel Evans said: "These are the Cinderella services of the NHS, they are expensive areas. The Government is prioritising quick, minor procedures while turning its back on long term ill effects that particularly affect the young and old.

"It's simply because they want to massage the figures to look good but the reality is that the system is failing whole swathes of people in East Lancashire. We need fewer spin doctors and more real doctors."

Labour MP Peter Pike said: "There's more money going into the NHS now than at any time when the Tories were in office.

"We do need to get these waiting lists downand we are committed to increasing spending for the next three years at levels way above inflation."