A Kent hospital trust has defended paying a consultant more than £200,000 in overtime in just one year.

The East Kent Hospitals University NHS Foundation Trust has responded after it was revealed the unnamed consultant was paid the sum on top of their salary in the 2015/16 year.

He/she was the second highest paid consultant in the UK, according to a Freedom of Information request by the BBC.

Only a consultant in Lancashire was paid more - at nearly £375,000 - in overtime for that year, the figures revealed.

It was claimed payments of around £600 for a four-hour shift were common - which is three to four times the normal consultant rate of pay.

But some were believed to have been paid around £1,000 in some trusts around the country.

The FoI request had responses from 140 trusts and health boards.

The average basic salary for a consultant is believed to be just under £90,000.

But trusts are blaming a shortage in the number of consultants for having to pay such high rates of overtime.

A spokesman for the Kent trust said it tried to treat patients as quickly as possible, which was difficult in some areas which had seen an increase in year-on-year referrals.

These included, with an ageing population, such ailments as aching joints and the need to treat them with surgery.

The spokesman said: "We are currently meeting this challenge with extra measures to ensure timely treatment, including extra clinics and surgical lists at evenings and weekends.

"Wherever possible, we use our own clinics and theatres, staff and equipment rather than outsourcing the work to private providers, as this is more cost-effective.

"When our doctors undertake this overtime, they are paid at a set, standard rate for working out-of-hours on top of their existing job plans.

"Their pay is dependent on productivity and caring for an agreed number of patients during these clinics or surgical lists."