Breast care services should stay in Brighton and Hove, a health trust's chief executive has admitted.

Stuart Welling, of Brighton Health Care NHS Trust, said about 100 people at a public meeting last night he did not want to move the breast unit from the Royal Sussex County Hospital to Haywards Heath.

He also revealed a firm of architects has been asked to re-examine the possibility of building a new, larger unit in the city.

The Argus is campaigning to keep breast cancer services in Brighton and Hove.

Mr Welling said that in an ideal world, facilities would stay in the city. But he said the existing Nigel Porter Unit was inadequate and patients' needs would be better served at the Princess Royal in Haywards Heath, which has space for a new unit.

The move would make it easier for many women in Mid Sussex to attend breast cancer appointments but would mean a difficult 34-mile round trip for the 2,000 women a year from Brighton and Hove who use breast cancer services.

Mr Welling said: "We do not want to move it. We acknowledge there is a problem with transport for people from Brighton and Hove to Haywards Heath and in an ideal world we would not move it.

"We have brought to you a proposal for what we believe is the best solution we can make of not an ideal situation."

Mr Welling said breast care had to be based at a major district general hospital and could not be accommodated on a small site where there were no wards.

He said it would not be possible to build a new breast care building at the Royal Sussex County Hospital for at least ten years because too much investment and building work was already taking place on the site.

He said he was not hopeful a firm of architects commissioned to re-examine the possibility of building a new unit in Brighton and Hove would come up with anything.

The trusts have proposed two options for breast care services in Brighton and Mid Sussex. The first involves transferring all breast care services apart from initial breast screening and radiotherapy to Haywards Heath.

The second would retain a basic breast care treatment centre at Brighton where women found to have abnormalities during screening could go before being referred to the Princess Royal.

Mr Welling spoke at the last in a series of public meetings to discuss the proposed merger of Brighton Health Care NHS Trust and Mid Sussex NHS Trust at Franklands Village Hall, Haywards Heath.