THE best way to secure the future of Winchester's Royal Hampshire County Hospital is to balance the books - and, according to health chief, Chris Evennett, this means sharing some services with Southampton University Hospital, closing wards, shedding jobs and making budget cuts.

However, the acting joint chief executive of Winchester and Eastleigh Healthcare Trust and Mid Hampshire Primary Care Trust says his vision for its future is that it will continue to provide a wide range of services.

Amid the concern over some surgery moving to Southampton, he said: "No change is the biggest risk."

He said the ambitious target was to save £14m over the next 12 months.

"The vision is still to have a wide range of district general hospital services and not to create a sort of cottage hospital. That is not what we want to do.

"We want to have a broad range of local services - not least because many of the population who use our services live in rural areas and we want to make sure access is easy."

He added: "Collaboration with Southampton is important to make sure the hospital is sustainable in the future."

Mr Evennett, who lives in Winchester, insisted that the aim was to keep most services local, including day surgery, outpatients, A&E, the children's ward and maternity.

However, the 45-year-old father-of-two refused to offer any guarantee about maternity until after a Hampshire-wide HealthFit review this summer.

"I can't offer an absolute guarantee. However, it is my intention to have maternity services on this site. What we have to do is make sure it is sustainable for the future."

Issues to be considered include European Union rules limiting junior doctors' working hours and providing cover by consultants.

The public will have a chance to have their say over plans for a single surgical service this summer.

The plan is to create "centres of excellence" with Southampton and Winchester specialising in different complex operations.

The aim is to save money as well as improve patient care - but Mr Evennett admitted that the costings had not yet been done.

It is proposed that Southampton would provide surgery on veins, urinary tracts and lower stomach problems while patients needing non-emergency stomach and intestine treatment would go to the RHCH.

Health chiefs are also considering sharing orthopaedic, breast, eye, nose, throat and some emergency surgery.