A man wasted hours of 999 crews' time with crank calls.

Christopher Methold, who dresses as a woman and is known as Christina Oldham, bombarded emergency services with hundreds of calls stopping them from dealing with genuine cases.

Methold also took up the time of doctors by going to casualty claiming to have taken overdoses.

The 38-year-old from Tisbury Road, Hove, also phoned NHS Direct unecessarily, taking up 234 hours in the course of 240 calls.

A judge accepted yesterday the calls were a cry for help but said he had a duty to protect those who genuinely needed help.

He imposed a three-year anti-social behaviour order on Methold who yesterday pleaded guilty to making public nuisance calls and was referred to as "she" at Hove Crown Court.

Methold was also given a three-year conditional discharge and warned she faced between two or three years in prison if she breached the order.

It prevents her from visiting or phoning any hospital without a genuine reason and from contacting NHS Direct unless by written agreement.

Methold was also banned from making 999 calls or contacting any police officer unless it is a genuine emergency.

Rowan Jenkins, prosecuting, said Methold made 999 calls while she was a patient at Mill View Hospital, Hove, between October last year and May this year.

He said she made between six and ten calls a week saying she had taken an overdose or cut her wrists.

Because they were emergency calls, Sussex Ambulance Service had to send an ambulance crew to her home.

Mr Jenkins said Methold had also gone to casualty at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, Brighton, a number of times.

She claimed to have taken overdoses and on one occasion said she had swallowed rat poison but later left without being seen by staff.

Mr Jenkins said: "Unlike psychiatrists, the hospital staff are obliged to treat people who come to casualty and cannot say there is nothing wrong with them and they should go away."

He said Methold went to Brighton police station in February to make a complaint against police but instead was arrested for making public nuisance calls.

Timothy Banks, defending, said: "This was clearly a huge waste of public time and money but her behaviour was a cry for help.

"She is someone who has severe anxiety-related problems and is of previous good character.

"Her anxiety still leads her to self-harm but there is now far less nuisance behaviour and there is hope for the future."

Sentencing, Judge David Rennie said: "Staff at hospitals, on phone lines as well as the emergency services, were bombarded over six months with hundreds of attention-seeking and needless calls.

"Because we have a caring and compassionate health service which takes every call seriously, their staff were diverted away from caring for genuinely needy people."

Methold did not want to comment as he left court.