HEALTH bosses have approved major plans to replace inpatient services which were axed when the shutters went up on Bishopstoke's popular Mount Hospital.

Despite a long-running battle by local campaigners to save the hospital, the last patients were transferred to Winchester's Royal Hampshire County Hospital last month.

Health chiefs said The Mount - which primarily cared for older patients - was past its sell-by date, incapable of providing modern medical care and in need of £1.7m repairs.

Now the board of Eastleigh and Test Valley South Primary Care Trust (PCT) has agreed a package of measures which include:

A new rehabilitation unit in the Eastleigh area.

Expansion of the community rehabilitation team to support people in their own homes.

Day care facilities and local outpatient physiotherapy clinics.

The new specialised rehabilitation unit could be on stream in summer next year, although no decision has been made about where it will be situated. It is also understood that the new bedded unit might be provided by the NHS or a private provider.

New services are expected to develop gradually over the next 18 months with expansion of the community rehab team in the new year, integration of The Mount's day hospital and the rehab team in April and commissioning of the new bedded unit next summer.

Chairman of Eastleigh and Test Valley South PCT, Lynne Lockyer, said: "An invitation for formal tender for the rehab unit will now be issued. At the same time, we will begin to work on the expansion of the community rehabilitation team.

"There is obviously a great deal to do, but we are determined to work as hard as possible to deliver the kind of service that people have told us they would like to see."

Eastleigh councillor Glynn Davies-Dear, who campaigned against the closure of The Mount, told the Daily Echo: "I still regret that The Mount had to close but there is no use crying over spilt milk. We have to get on with re-provisioning the services.

"It was not the PCT which was responsible for The Mount closing, it was the Winchester and Eastleigh Healthcare Trust who owned it.

"The PCT has been promised the funding to re-provision and is desperately trying to get the services in place without delay, but they are having a great deal of problems in finding the staff needed."