Health chiefs say there is not a suitable site in Brighton and Hove to expand the breast cancer care service to meet Government targets.

Stuart Welling, chief executive of Brighton Health Care NHS Trust, said the move to Haywards Heath was necessary to meet the targets.

He said: "In an ideal world we wouldn't move it but it's a pragmatic solution to a problem which needs to be solved. We do not want to move it but we don't feel we have any choice."

Mr Welling says the Nigel Porter Breast Care Unit, at the Royal Sussex County Hospital, could even come under threat of closure if it failed to meet the Government targets.

The proposals to move the unit are part of a wider and more complex restructuring of health services in the Brighton and Hove and Haywards Heath areas.

In February this year, it was decided Brighton Health Care NHS Trust, which manages the Royal Sussex, some services at Brighton General, the Royal Alexandra Hospital for Sick Children and Sussex Eye Hospital would merge with the Mid Sussex NHS Trust.

Mid Sussex manages the Princess Royal Hospital and Hurstwood Park Neurosciences Centre in Haywards Heath.

The two trusts have a history of working together and senior staff decided they should develop proposals for the joint provision of services.

The three aims of the merger are to ensure all departments at the Royal Sussex and Princess Royal work together as one, move some services into one centre and create one trust to run the two hospitals.

The merged trust will come into operation in April but proposed changes to services, including the transfer of breast care services to Haywards Heath, are out for public consultation until October 19.

A document, Strengthening Hospital Services In Central Sussex, says health chiefs recognise there would be extra travelling time to Haywards Heath.

It reads: "We hope that the extra time and trouble will be compensated for by the enhanced standards of care and treatment we can expect because of the combined expertise of a specialist team working in this vital specialty."

The document says about 2,700 women from the Brighton and Hove and surrounding area would be affected by the transfer.

This equates to 8,000 outpatient appointments each year and 800 women staying in hospital for in-patient treatment each year.

Currently these women visit the Nigel Porter unit in Brighton.