`Rolls-Royce' hip joints put hospital pounds 1m over budget.

Byline: Gareth Hughes

HEALTH bosses in North Wales may have to cut services after surgeons contributed to running up a pounds 1m deficit.

The insistence of orthopaedic specialists on using state-of-the-art bone implants has caused a pounds 175,000 overspend within North East Wales NHS Trust.

The trust, which runs Wrexham Maelor Hospital, has also been hit by a shortage of consultant psychiatrists - forcing bosses to spend an extra pounds 262,000 on outside agencies to do the work.

Finance director Wayne Harris has warned some services may have to be cut unless North Wales Health Authority comes to the Trust's aid.

He told members of the Trust Board the bill caused by the shortage of psychiatrists could rise to almost pounds 1m over 12 months.

``We have offered the Health Authority two alternative courses of action - either to cease the agency provision and restrict service within available funds or for the Authority to provide additional funds to continue with the present service provision,'' said Mr Harris.

Deputy chief executive Mark Common said the orthopaedic overspend was partly due to newly-appointed surgeons using different techniques and insisting on using different implants such as hip and knee replacements to those normally used within the Trust. ``They want to use the Rolls-Royce versions instead of the Mini versions,'' he said.

Mr Harris said he would be asking both the Health Authority and Welsh Assembly for funding.

Mr Common also warned the problem of the ``postcode lottery'' in waiting times for surgery could get worse.

Referring to recent publicity over the difference in waiting-time targets between England and Wales, he said the North East Wales Trust, bordering on both West Cheshire and Shropshire, was in a more difficult position that other Welsh Trusts.

He said the English waiting targets, already lower than those in Wales, were being reduced still further.

Earlier this week the Daily Post highlighted the discrepancy over patients at the Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic Hospital in Gobowen, close to the Wales-England border. The waiting-list target for English patients is 15 months but the National Assembly's target for Welsh patients is 18 months.