Campaigners have warned they will fight any plans to transfer a neurological centre out of Sussex.

Hurstwood Park at Haywards Heath is the only dedicated specialist head injuries unit in the county.

Health bosses are reviewing the services provided by the unit to decide its long-term future.

Options being looked at include transferring the unit to Brighton, expanding the existing site in the grounds of Princess Royal Hospital or moving it out of Sussex altogether.

The unit was at the centre of the successful Save Our Surgery (SOS) Campaign, backed by The Argus in the mid Nineties.

Thousands of people signed petitions condemning recommendations by regional health experts to close the unit and send patients to London.

West Sussex Health Authority and East Sussex, Brighton and Hove Health Authority eventually agreed in September 1996 to keep the unit open for another ten years.

During that time it was agreed to look at possible ways of building a new unit at Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton instead.

Now a specialist group made up of health representatives from Sussex, Surrey and Kent is due to make its recommendations on the unit's future after 2006.

If the recommendations are accepted by the new Surrey and Sussex Strategic Health Authority and involve major changes, there will be a public consultation.

Graham Bickler, a director of public health in Sussex and is a member of the review group, said the emphasis was on keeping the unit in Sussex but all possible options had to be considered.

He said: "We are still at a very early stage and are looking at things that are not going to happen for another five years."

Ann Cummings, chairman of the Headway Hurstwood Park day care centre and support group, was at the forefront of the SOS campaign.

She set up the group in 1988 after her son Ian received serious head injuries in a car accident and was treated at Hurstwood.

Mrs Cummings, from Seaford, said she would be keeping a close watch on developments.

She has reservations about the unit being sent to Brighton but is determined to make sure services are not transferred further afield.

She said: "Whatever happens, it is vital neurosurgery remains in Sussex.

"As a carer of someone who was treated at Haywards Heath, I would prefer the unit stayed there. The grounds and outlook there were very good for the patients and relatives going through so much trauma.

"The hospital is also in a good position as patients come to it from across Sussex. It has good parking facilities and there is less traffic."

Between 1997 and 2001, more than half of the patients seen at Hurstwood came from the East Sussex, Brighton and Hove Health Authority area.

Just under 40 per cent came from West Sussex with most of the rest from Surrey and Kent.

The review is being carried out by the Kent, Surrey and Sussex specialist commissioning group, which is responsible for where specialist services such as neurosurgery are provided in the region.