HEALTH chiefs have admitted that increasing pressure on GPs and hospitals in East Lancashire could affect the quality of service.

East Lancashire Health Authority has conceded that the strain on service providers has become a permanent dilemma.

And they have warned that the demand on services will reach a peak during the winter.

Issues causing major concern are trolley waits within casualty, cancelled operations and medical patients occupying surgical beds.

Health bosses have already drawn up short-term plans to cope with the expected surge in emergencies during the winter.

But Bev Humphrey, the health authority's director of strategic planning and contracting, said it was a longer-term problem. She said: "Pressures on service providers are increasingly becoming constant rather than periodic and the potential for this to affect quality of service is evident.

"Of particular concern are cancellation of elective admissions, medical patients increasingly outlying within other specialties, trolley waits within accident and emergency and direct pressures on staff and staffing."

The health authority and the two NHS hospital trusts in East Lancashire have formed a steering group to tackle the problems of winter pressures.

GP emergency admissions in East Lancashire rose by more than 30 per cent between 1991 and 1995.

The average length of stay within general and acute specialties has reduced from 8.5 to 6.03 days.

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