HEALTH bosses in Worcestershire have spoken of their concern over a predicted £48 million deficit - saying it is "critical" to tackle the cash crisis.

As The Advertiser revealed last month the organisation running Redditch's Alexandra Hospital has fallen further into the red.

Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust is now predicting an end-of-year shortfall of £48 million instead of a previous prediction of £31.3 million.

A new report on the position calls the finances a "significant challenge" but pledges that "clinical safety will not be compromised" as attempts are made to claw back the shortfall.

During a recent acute trust board meeting interim finance director Colin Gentle said a lot of work needs to be done to get it under control.

"When we look at all our key drivers all of this comes from our workflows and operational difficulties," he said.

"Clearly it's been a disappointing month (August), there's no getting away from that.

"We've been monitoring and managing nurse agency spending on a weekly basis and I'm pleased to say we're making progress there, we're spending around £45,000 less a week on agency staff across the trust."

He told fellow board members there was much more "we still need to do".

Bryan McGinity, a non-executive director, said: "Obviously cost control is absolutely critical."

During August the trust had planned for a spending deficit of £16.2 million but it ended at £23.8 million - £7.4 worse than planned.

The main drivers include having to bring in extra staff, especially for A&E, costing an extra £2.7 million, and the impact of not enough people being medically fit for discharge, leading in an overspill of £2.5 million.

Income fines and penalties and various other overspends worsened the position further.

The trust runs The Alex, as well as Worcestershire Royal Hospital and Kidderminster Hospital.

This is just the latest in a long series of financial woes for the trust, which ended the 2014-15 financial year £25.9 million in the red - more than double its forecast at the start of the year of £9.8 million.