19 June 2012 Last updated at 12:16 ET

East Yorkshire's Castle Hill Hospital heart ward to close

A cardiac ward at an East Yorkshire hospital is to close next month, the Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals NHS Trust said.

The closure of one of the six heart wards at Castle Hill Hospital in Cottingham is part of the trust's plans to save £94m by 2015.

Patients from North East Lincolnshire, Scarborough and York will be affected, as well as those from Hull and East Yorkshire.

The trust said no jobs would go.

Patients will be treated at Castle Hill's Centre for Cardiology and Cardiothoracic Surgery, the trust said.

Alan Webb from the trust said: "This will see a reduction in the overall number of beds for cardiology patients."

But he said changes meant patients would now be seen more quickly.

"We have communicated this to our staff and while some may be transferred to other wards and areas within our hospitals none will lose their jobs as a result."

Beds axed

The ward is expected to close mid-July.

In 2010, the trust announced plans to cut a total of 300 beds from both its Castle Hill and Hull Royal Infirmary hospitals.

The hospitals had a combined total of 1,500 beds.

It was reported that the reduction in the number of beds would save about £10m.

Phil Morley, chief executive of the trust, said: "Part of our savings plan will be to reduce the number of staff we currently employ by approximately 1-2% each year for the next five years, although we believe we can achieve this without the need for redundancies."