Patients are continuing to cause major bed-blocking problems for hospitals.

More than 100 ready to be discharged are stuck in beds run by Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust.

They are unable to leave because either a suitable care home place cannot be found for them or proper arrangements to provide support in their own home has not been arranged.

The knock-on effect means many patients in the accident and emergency department at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton, have to wait longer to be admitted and routine operations are being cancelled.

The trust is experiencing money problems and has already spent £4.9 million more than it can afford.

Much of the overspend can be blamed on the trust being forced to provide costly private care for patients who have been waiting a long time for treatment or have had their operations cancelled.

The A&E department has been trying out a new way of assessing and treating patients so they spend less time in the department but bed shortages mean patients are still having to wait.

Anne Merricks, the trust's director of performance management, said: "The subject of delayed discharges is still a significant problem and it is something that is being worked on constantly.

"The new see-and-treat system at A&E is progressing well but access to beds is the key issue."

A new target has been introduced by the Department of Health, which says that from the end of March 90 per cent of A&E patients have to be seen, assessed, treated and either discharged or admitted within four hours.

At the moment the trust is only meeting this target for 67 per cent of A&E patients.

A series of plans are being put into place to try to deal with the trust's problems caused by bed-blocking and the financial implications.

This includes opening more beds at the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath, so that patients do not have to be referred to private hospitals.

Trust chief executive Stuart Welling said: "There is a lot of ongoing work aimed at making sure patients get access to services and that we meet the targets being set.

"These are already in place and we will learn over the next few weeks how successful they have been."