Hospital staff are facing mounting complaints over losing elderly patients' false teeth.

Families have accused the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton of humiliating their relatives by accidentally binning their dentures and not replacing them.

The Argus reported on Tuesday how 86-year-old Joan Gwynne-Smith has been having difficulty eating since her bottom teeth, top teeth and half her spare set went missing on Bristol ward.

Her son Michael blamed staff for losing them and said they had a "couldn't care less" attitude about the problem.

Now Mike Wilson has contacted The Argus to say his mother Mary Wilson stayed on the same ward and suffered the same problem.

He said: "My mother stayed in the same room - there is only one separate room on Bristol ward - and the staff lost her teeth too. The humiliation that is heaped on patients in that ward is unbelievable.

"She's back at home now but the whole situation has distressed her very much and left her quite depressed."

Mrs Wilson's dentures were lost during her stay in hospital last December and have not been replaced yet. The lower plate went missing first and the upper plate two days later.

Her son has arranged for a dentist to visit her home in Essex Place, Brighton, but the earliest appointment is April 30.

It means she will have been without teeth for nearly five months.

Mr Wilson said: "The word disgraceful is the only polite one that comes to mind."

He has made a formal complaint to Peter Coles, chief executive of Brighton and Sussex University Hospitals NHS Trust, which runs the Royal Sussex.

In his letter to the trust, Mr Wilson wrote: "It was suggested my mother had been wrapping them in tissues and that, consequently, a domestic must have picked them up and thrown them away.

"Do they not know they are dealing with ill, distressed and sometimes confused people?

"Do they not think that a solid, unyielding and quite large object on a patient's table might be worth checking before simply dropping it in a bin bag?

"And to do it twice?"

He added: "No one seems in the least concerned about their loss or to have considered their replacement. Perhaps the authority takes the view that teeth are like other personal valuables and so will take no responsibility."

A trust spokeswoman said: "Dentures go missing in hospitals and the trust is not always responsible for the loss of personal property.

"We always recommend patients use the denture pots provided.

"Mrs Wilson was given a denture pot to keep her false teeth in during her hospital stay.

"However, as she chose to wrap them in a tissue, we believe it is likely they were mistaken for an item of rubbish."