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Emergency stroke services will be lost from one of the county's largest hospitals in a shake-up over a lack of specialist nurses.
The shortage at Medway Maritime Hospital in Gillingham means bosses have been forced to transfer urgent services out of the hospital.
Health chiefs have been accused of "running down" stroke services at Medway hospital creating "uncertainty among staff" during an ongoing review of the future of the unit at the hospital.
Staff have left "over a period of time" following the decision last year to create three larger "hyper acute" units elsewhere in Kent - Ashford, Maidstone and Dartford - a spokesman for Medway NHS Trust (MTF) told KentOnline.
A statement released by the Medway NHS Foundation Trust today announced it cannot safely run the service after failing to fill vacancies as five stroke specialist nurses leave the hospital at the end of the month.
The new plan will come into effect from July 1 with patients from Medway and Swale instead taken by blue light ambulance to Maidstone or Darent Valley Hospital (DVH). Most are expected to be taken to Maidstone.
The trust confirmed it normally employs six specialist nurses but this was set to fall to just one by the end of June.
The nurses are responsible for initial assessment of stroke patients alongside doctors and also administering vital clot-stopping drugs.
But the trust says "despite best efforts" it has not been possible to "recruit new appropriately trained and qualified specialist nursing staff to fill the soon to be vacant posts".
Managers say the loss of staff means it will be "impossible to maintain the necessary quality of stroke service" which usually operates 24/7.
In a statement, the NHS trust said: "This emergency transfer of services will ensure the NHS can maintain ongoing safe and high-quality care of patients during the vital initial hours and days following a stroke.
"This urgent decision has been taken without the usual required formal consultation with patients, public and stakeholders, because it is the view of our stroke clinicians, the GP-led CCG, (Clinical Commissioning Group) and the clinically led Kent and Medway Stroke Network that there is a risk to the quality of care for patients if the stroke service continues at Medway after the end of June."
The future of stroke services in Kent and Medway is currently under review with Medway Maritime Hospital set to lose its service under plans approved by the county's clinical commissioning groups last year.
Medway Council has launched a judicial review against the closure plans, which would see three larger "hyper acute" units opened at William Harvey Hospital in Ashford, Darent Valley in Dartford and Maidstone Hospital.
But the trust said today the changes it has revealed are "separate to the wider plans to improve stroke services in Kent and Medway".
Leader of Medway Council, Cllr Alan Jarrett (Con), said he was "very sorry to learn" of the changes to the "excellent stroke service" in Medway.
"We completely understand that patient safety must come first and the hospital has done a brilliant job over the past three months in providing first class care for the victims of Covid-19 in very difficult circumstances.
"It is because patient safety is paramount in our thinking that we are seeking through the courts to overturn what we believe is a perverse and unjustifiable course of action and will be continuing with our appeal against the decision not to locate one of the three Kent and Medway Hyper Acute Stroke Units here in Medway.
"The responsibility for any early deaths that result from the closure of the stroke facility at MFT will be laid firmly at the door of the CCG.
"It seems the staff shortages may have been in part caused by the CCGs decision to run down the stroke facility here in Medway, thereby creating uncertainty amongst staff.”
Cllr Jarrett said he believes the council has a "clearly evidenced case" to show the need for stroke services to remain in Medway.
The High Court rejected campaigners' judicial review proposals earlier this year which is now being appealed.
Cllr Teresa Murray, Labour deputy leader and opposition spokesman for health and adult social care at Medway Council, said she was "devastated" by the closure before knowing the outcome of the High Court challenge.
She said: "At the start of the consultation two years ago Medway was rated as capable of housing a HASU (Hyper Acute Stroke Units) and one of the leading consultants in the country had come to work there based on this possibility.
"Staff shortages may have been in part caused by the CCGs decision to run down the stroke facility"
"By the time the consultation ended the goal posts had changed and local people’s wishes had been ignored, it’s not surprising staff have left as their future was from that time very uncertain.
"At a time when we are all being discouraged from making unnecessary journeys people in Medway will have to travel to Maidstone to see their loved ones who have suffered a stroke and paramedics will be faced with more of a challenge when they try to give timely life saving treatment.
"If the outcome of the judicial review favours locating a HASU at Medway it will now take longer to get up and running."
The NHS says patients, carers, patient groups and local authorities will be contacted about the loss of emergency stroke services at Medway to "clarify the reason and update on current and future plans".
The move is set to be ratified by the Kent and Medway Clinical Commissioning Group at its meeting on June 25 and considered by the Medway Health and Adult Social Care overview and scrutiny committee.
