Plans to convert two geriatric hospital wards into offices have come under fire amid anger over a shortage of care facilities.

Health bosses agreed to set aside the wards for a range of care in the community places in 1994 including day care, mental health and other health care for the elderly but now they have turned round their decision.

It has sparked an outcry over what campaigners say is a crisis in Mid Sussex over a lack of adequate hospital care for the elderly.

The Mid Sussex Prime Care Trust has applied for planning permission to turn the Kleinwort and Nightingale wards at the former Haywards Heath Hospital, Butlers Green Road, into offices.

The trust has promised the closure will be a temporary measure for only two years while it converts a house near the site into offices but this has been met with suspicion from campaigners.

The wards have been left unused for eight years but there had been plans to re-open them for nursing care.

The Haywards Heath Society was among the first to object to the office plans and warned of a deepening crisis if no other property is set aside for geriatric hospital wards.

Richard Moon, society spokesman, said: "They were hospital wards and there is no reason why they should be changed.

"We all know what temporary means and it can be temporary to permanent once a use has been established. They were designed as hospital wards and now there is a shortage of beds, that's where people should go."

Mr Moon said: "We oppose it and we feel councillors should as well. On one hand there isn't enough accommodation for people who are ill and here we have purpose-built accommodation, albeit old, that they are not going to use."

Mr Moon said the society was concerned the money spent converting the wards to offices could be better spent keeping them as wards and updating them.

The Haywards Heath Hospital site was closed eight years ago. Since then the eastern part of the site has been sold and redeveloped as a care home for the elderly.

When the hospital was closing Mid Sussex District Council identified a range of community orientated uses appropriate for the site.

These were a mental health care centre, a nursing home for elderly mentally ill, a day centre for the elderly, a small-scale hostel or care accommodation, small offices, meetings or residential accommodation. Residential accommodation has so far been resisted.

The brief also indicated that as many of the existing buildings as possible should be kept.

Mid Sussex District Councillor Anne Jones said: "The Haywards Heath Hospital was absolutely crucial in caring for the elderly. All those beds are what we have lost so if they take the remaining space we won't have the resources we need.

"We are desperately short of beds."

A decision will be taken at a meeting of the Central Area Planning Committee this Thursday.

Christine Barwell, chairwoman of Mid Sussex PCT, said the most cost effective solution was to use at least one, possibly both wards as offices temporarily while nearby Ellis House was pulled down and rebuilt and while they also built a doctor's surgery on the site.