HEALTH chiefs in Hampshire are warning they need to save more than £570 million over the next five years if they are going to continue delivering care to those who need it.

The size of the black hole facing health services in the county has been revealed in a masterplan that has been produced by local clinical groups in a bid to set out how best to meet the challenges facing the health and care system.

For the first time organisations across Hampshire and the Isle of Wight have combined their individual action plans to produce an overall strategy for the region.

The Sustainability and Transformation Plan (STP) has taken eight months to compile and sets out the major challenges facing health services in the region.

It claims that if care continues to be delivered in the same way there will be a £577m shortfall in funding, meaning health groups have to come up with different ways of delivering health care more efficiently.

The theme of the document is to reduce the amount of patients needing acute care by focussing on a range of preventative measures including helping smokers find the help they need to quit the habit.

Other measures include a diabetes prevention programme and improved cancer screening to ensure people with the disease are identified earlier. A reduced reliance on agency staff is also planned.

There will also be a more expanded role for community hospitals and more support for people at home to stop them being admitted into emergency care.

The report points out that the health system is under more pressure than ever as people in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight are generally living longer, but also with multiple long-term physical and mental health conditions.

It says too many people stay in hospital longer than they need to, known as bed-blocking, because of problems getting care to support them at home and gaps in the number of doctors, nurses and other health workers needed.

The STP says a discharge plan will be drawn up for each patient in a bid to ensure they are sent home or moved to another facility "without delay".

Other parts of the action plan centre on the importance of prevention rather than cure.

However, the five-year action plan has sparked fears that services across the county could be cut in a bid to balance the books.

The report outlines how almost 20-per-cent of health service land in Hampshire and the Isle of Wight will be sold off to reduce costs by £24 million.

The NHS denied reports that it is also planning to scrap 300 hospital beds, saying managers will use them "more effectively" by providing extra care in the community.

Sustainability and Transformation Leader for the region Richard Samuel said there were no firm plans in place but that changes would have to be made to how care is delivered.

He said: "All we do know is that the current model we have is not clinically sustainable over the next five years."

But retired GP Iain MacLennan - a National Health Action Party candidate in the 2013 Eastleigh by-election - described the document as a blueprint for cuts.

He said the STP was "full of wonderful fluffy bits of jargon", adding: "On the face of it they sound positive but unfortunately a lot of these words are just a code for cuts".

The STP has been developed by all the health and care organisations in the county, who say the public will now be consulted.