An administrative error has been blamed after a hospital trust published the wrong waiting list figures.

Worthing and Southlands Hospitals NHS Trust had been reporting about 1,850 fewer patients on its outpatients list in the last year.

The trust says the mistake was due to human error in recording figures for its monthly reports and no patients had been affected by delayed or missed appointments.

The news comes less than two months after revelations that waiting list figures at another trust were deliberately cut to meet Government targets.

Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust, which runs Crawley Hospital, admitted up to 1,500 patients had been taken from official lists during the last quarter of 1998/99.

Blame was placed at the feet of then chief executive Isobel Gowan, who left the trust last year.

Worthing and Southlands says its situation is different.

Chief executive Roger Greene said: "The 1,850 patients have all had their appointment dates allocated in the normal way, depending on the clinical urgency.

"It is the system for reporting the numbers which has not been accurate and this has meant our monthly returns to the health authority have been under-reported.

"I am sorry this error has occurred. It is especially demoralising for staff who have been working so hard to see more patients.

"Everything will be done to maintain the momentum and reach the Government's target by the end of the year."

An in-house check revealed the problem earlier this month. The trust immediately invited the NHS executive to look at the data.

Bob Ricketts, director of performance NHS South East regional office, said: "We are satisfied that this is a simple question of miscoding and that patient care has not been compromised.

"We are working closely with the trust to ensure the correct figures are reported."

Worthing Community Health Council chief officer Trevor Richards said: "This is a very unfortunate occurrence, especially when I know how hard staff are working to reduce waiting times.

"I have spoken with the chief executive and am confident that this was a recording error and that the same number of patients are on the waiting list."