CONSULTANTS at Maidstone Hospital claim patients' lives could be put at risk if a proposal to move trauma care to Tunbridge Wells ever becomes a reality.

The option is being considered by Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust as part of a long-term review of hospital services, which began in June. If approved, people breaking bones in falls or road accidents would have their operations carried out at Kent and Sussex Hospital, 17 miles from the County Town.

The trust is considering whether centralising orthopaedic and trauma care on one site would help solve recruitment problems, attract more high-calibre candidates and ensure tough guidelines limiting doctors' working hours are met. However, some senior doctors believe a move to Kent and Sussex would be premature with the planned opening of a replacement acute 595 bed hospital at Pembury in 2011.

The trust is due to publish a discussion paper next month, setting out a list of possible long-term options aimed at improving the delivery of a number of key services. It is hoped the document will encourage debate before an official period of public consultation, expected to start early next year.

In a leaked report, Maidstone Hospital's deputy theatre manager Peter O'Neill, states that moving trauma cases away from Maidstone would put lives at risk. Mr O'Neill was asked to prepare a briefing paper about the consequences of centralising trauma and orthopaedics on a single site.

In the report he reveals that about 1,600 trauma operations are carried out annually at Maidstone Hospital with a similar workload at Kent and Sussex. Transferring patients with multiple injuries from Maidstone to Tunbridge Wells could be a high risk strategy, Mr O' Neill claims.

The report states: "Poly trauma patients brought into Maidstone A & E would be resuscitated at Maidstone and transferred to the K and S for an operation. This would create a very high risk of complications, or possibly death to the patient."