AT least 50 patients have had their hospital appointments cancelled as a result of an NHS strike set to take place this morning.

Thousands of health workers in East Lancashire were planning to stage a second four-hour walk-out as part of an ongoing national pay dispute.

Members of nine unions pledged to join the protest over the government’s decision not to accept a recommended one per cent pay rise for all staff.

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Gill Simpson, director of operations at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust, said: “Our main objective is to provide high quality and safe services to patients during periods of industrial action and we will be putting contingency plans in place to ensure that disruption to services is kept to a minimum and that the quality of patient care is not compromised.

"All our general outpatient departments will be fully open but the action will affect approximately 50 ultrasound patients who have had their appointments re-booked. These patients still have the option to change this if the new appointment is inconvenient.”

Workers at North West Ambulance Service and Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust are also due to strike, following similar action last month.

The biggest union, Unison, said its members will also take part in six days of action short of a strike, until Sunday, when members will take their scheduled breaks, leave on time and not work unpaid overtime.

Amy Barringer, the union's North West’s Head of Health, said: “Morale is low in our NHS. Staff are working hard to keep services afloat but are being treated very badly by the Government.

NHS workers are now 10 per cent worse off than they were in 2010 and the refusal to pay even one per cent this year has felt like a slap in the face.

Health secretary Jeremy Hunt has said: “The majority of NHS staff get an automatic three per cent increment (pay increase on a fixed scale). But we can’t afford to give a one per cent rise to people already getting that.”