A CAMPAIGN has been launched to save vital treatment received by heart patients across Hampshire.

Scores of patients and relatives, backed by the Daily Echo, are demanding the service is given a reprieve.

They contacted their local MPs Desmond Swayne and Julian Lewis in the hope of winning their support.

This week we revealed how the eight-week rehabilitation classes, held at leisure centres across Hampshire to help heart patients recover and learn healthier lifestyles, are being axed by health chiefs who run Southampton's hospitals, as part of a multi-million-pound cost-savings drive.

The classes form the third stage in a four-phase rehabilitation programme, with stage one providing specialist advice to patients on cardiac wards, and stage two a telephone advice service.

Stage four takes the exercise element of the course to the next level, but cannot be undertaken without completing stage three.

Hospital bosses say the move will save no more than £20,000 - a fraction of their £15m target.

But heart patients from across the city insist that axing the classes will cost much more in the long run because without the proper aftercare, dozens of people could end up back in hospital. Now a group of patients who all completed stage three following heart surgery for various conditions are setting up an action group to fight for the classes they say changed their lives.

The group is currently attending stage four classes at the Applemore Recreation Centre in Dibden Purlieu.

Ann Fry, 62, of Curlew Drive, Hythe, who is organising the action group, said: "We have got to fight this. We have benefited so much from the classes and we need to fight to save them for others behind us who still need them.

"I don't think it is financially viable to cut the classes. They spend thousands operating on us and thousands nursing us back to health. But people will end up going back into hospital unless they have the proper care to get them back on their feet."

Colin Pankhurst, 44, of Blackfield, said: "When we came to these classes we were scared. We all thought we were scrap-heap jobs.

"But the nurses who ran the classes showed us what we could do and encouraged us to exercise.

"We are all now probably a lot healthier than we were before our operations. We eat better and we do more exercise."

Julia Neve, 67, of Rushington Manor, Totton, said the classes had helped her get back on her feet after a by-pass operation much more quickly than her husband John, who had the same operation eight years ago when the classes were not available.

She said. "When you have had heart surgery you are frightened of everything. You question everything. You don't know what your body can and cannot do. The classes put you at ease. They build up your confidence as well as your health."

Romsey Liberal Democrat MP Sandra Gidley, said it was short-sighted to axe a service that has significant long-term benefits.

"If we are serious about the NHS being a health service rather than a sickness service we must not concentrate purely on the acute care issues," she said. Julian Lewis, Tory MP for New Forest East, and Desmond Swayne, Tory MP for New Forest West, were unavailable. A spokesman for the British Heart Foundation said: "We believe it is of vital importance for post surgery and post heart attack victims to receive the education, advice and confidence the cardiac rehabilitation programme gives them."

What do you think about the cuts? Are you affected? Tell us. Contact Sarah Lefebve on 023 8042 4996 or e-mail using the link above.