FACED with an overspend of more than £4million last year and the need to make significant savings, East Lancashire NHS Trust has some difficult decisions to make.

Money has to be saved but the impact of any cuts also has to be spread equally across different parts of the area so that, for example, patient care in Burnley and Pendle is not disproportionately hit compared with Blackburn and Hyndburn.

Also a careful balance has to be struck so savings do not leave patients in East Lancashire with worse care than their neighbours.

With all this in mind it is not surprising that there was considerable upset at the idea of closing the 15-bed stroke unit at Burnley General Hospital.

The news came just a fortnight after managers shut a rehabilitation ward at Queen's Park Hospital in Blackburn.

Now senior consultant Dr Nitish Goorah says following a meeting it has been agreed that the unit for patients recovering from strokes will be kept open but moved into an empty area in the hospital's main acute services block.

It appears talks between managers and medical experts have produced a commonsense compromise which should minimise adverse effects on patients. Pity the consultation didn't take place before the upsetting announcement was made.