Campaigners fighting plans to move breast care services out of Brighton and Hove say similar schemes across the country have failed because of public transport.

Thousands of people have been let down when health bosses restructured health services in other towns and cities.

Campaigners fighting to keep the breast care unit in Brighton feel residents could find themselves in a similar position if the move was allowed.

Brighton Health Care NHS Trust wants to move the Nigel Porter Unit for Breast Care from the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton to the Princess Royal Hospital in Haywards Heath because more space is needed.

Bosses say there is no suitable site at the Brighton hospital to build a larger unit.

Health chiefs are working with public transport groups to investigate the links between Brighton, and other towns across Sussex, which would need to have access to Haywards Heath.

But campaigners have highlighted other cities where patients have suffered under the restructuring of hospital services.

Tory MP Sir Michael Spicer has been locked in a battle to improve public transport links between hospitals in his West Worcestershire constituency.

Last year, Sir Michael discovered bus services promised before operations were moved from Worcester to Kidderminster had not materialised.

A leaflet issued by Worcestershire Health Authority and the Worcestershire Acute Hospital NHS Trust said the bus service would be in place before the operations were moved.

Sir Michael, an MP since 1974, said last year: "It's outrageous that promises made by the health authorities to calm anxieties about changes have been broken in this way."

John Austin, MP for Erith and Thamesmead, London, faced a similar problem and branded bus services, meant to provide transport to the new Queen Elizabeth Hospital, as "wholly inadequate".

He found patients reliant on public transport were struggling to meet appointments because of a limited service.

He said: "This is wholly inadequate for a new hospital which has limited capacity for cars."

Campaigners to keep the breast cancer unit in Brighton fear even if transport links were promised or created, they would either not materialise or disappear as soon as they started.

Jayne Bennett, a Brighton and Hove city councillor against the move, said: "It will not work when subsidies are already being cut to bus companies. Even if the health authority agreed to fund a bus it would be the first thing to be cut if it had to save money.

Campaigners say the unit should stay in Brighton as the majority of its 2,700 annual patients come from the city or the coastal strip. City dwellers statistically have lower car ownership figures than those in rural constituencies. Only 200 patients a year come from Mid Sussex.

Candy Morris, chief executive of West Sussex Health Authority, said: "Just as we listened to the views of people from Mid Sussex over the accident and emergency service at Haywards Heath, so we have listened to the views of Brighton and Hove people who were particularly concerned about the travelling difficulties that would be faced by women from the South Coast if we moved breast care services to Haywards Heath."

A transport feasibility study, looking at both transport and possible alternative sites for the unit, is under way.