BURNLEY General Hospital is lifting the standard of poor A&E statistics at East Lancashire's hospitals, it has been revealed.

Burnley's A&E is outperforming Black-burn's Queen's Park Hospital, figures show.

March was the worst month ever for East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust to meet a key target, to get 98 per cent of A&E patients seen within four hours.

The trust hit 95.85 per cent but it was this week revealed 97.15 per cent was at Burnley and 94.77 per cent was at Blackburn.

This meant 151 people had to wait longer than four hours at Burnley with 333 at Blackburn.

Trust bosses previously refused to reveal where the bulk of the problem lay.

A spokeswoman said: "We don't release figures split by hospital because it's considered we provide a larger East Lancashire A&E service."

But Burnley, Pendle and Rossendale Primary Care Trust, which organises services with the hospitals trust, has released the figures.

Emergency cases are also seen at Blackburn Royal Infirmary, which is to move to a massive extension at Queen's Park in July.

By 2009 this hospital will take on around 16,000 extra A&E patients from Burnley a year under a controversial review of services.