A debt-ridden hospital trust has paid almost half a million pounds to money experts to get its finances under control.

Royal West Sussex NHS Trust, which runs St Richard's Hospital in Chichester, has spent £426,000 on a turnaround project over the past few months.

The fees include payments to KPMG consultants who worked at the hospital between February and April this year and turnaround director Ian McNuff, who is still at the trust.

The latest figures mean more than £1.8 million has been spent on external financial consultants by the NHS in Sussex during the past ten months.

St Richard's ended the last financial year more than £13 million in the red but the actual amount it owes is more than £35 million when debts from previous years are taken into account.

It has an annual budget of around £84 million and 2,500 staff.

St Richard's intends to shed about 200 posts over the next two years as part of plans to save more than £8 million.

It hopes to relocate staff to other posts within the organisation to avoid wholesale redundancies.

The trust says the proposals also focus on ensuring it works as efficiently as possible. This includes making full use of its theatres and ensuring patients do not stay in hospital any longer than necessary.

Trust managers say the turnaround advice was money well spent because it needed the extra help to get its finances back on track.

It was spending £1 million a month more than it could afford.

Trust chief executive Andrew Liles said: "There is no quick-fix to balance our books but the turnaround plan has the full support of the trust board, the Surrey and Sussex Strategic Health Authority (SHA) and Department of Health."

The trust is now working with primary care trust colleagues, social services and other NHS organisations as part of its long-term plans.

Surrey and Sussex Strategic Health Authority is carrying out a review of all county NHS services to find savings after it emerged organisations accumulated debts of almost £85 million last year.

St Richard's, Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals and Surrey and Sussex Healthcare NHS trusts were among organisations named and shamed by the Department of Health as needing extra help to get their finances under control and who had the turnaround teams sent in. Worthing and Southlands Hospitals, which ended the last financial year more than £10 million in the red, voluntarily brought in a team to offer advice.

It has spent more than £200,000 on consultants while Surrey and Sussex spent £700,000 and Brighton and Sussex more than £500,000.