Toddler's 120-mile operation trip

The toddler was turned away from three Sussex hospitals

A two-year-old girl with a broken wrist had to travel 120 miles and wait nine hours to get treatment, her parents say.

Sydney Tiley, from Hartfield in Sussex, was turned away from three Sussex hospitals before she was finally able to have a plaster cast fitted in London.

Her parents, Neil and Lucy Tiley said they had been assured in a meeting with the Brighton and Sussex Hospitals University NHS Trust that their daughter's ordeal would not happen again.

But they learnt that only a few days later, an 11-year-old boy with diabetes had to endure a 21-hour wait and travel more than 100 miles for treatment.

I was disgusted - I just couldn't believe it could happen in a modern day, Western country Neil Tiley

Sydney broke her wrist while at her grandparents' house in East Grinstead and was taken to the nearby Queen Victoria Hospital for an X-ray.

The hospital did not have the facilities to perform the necessary operation, so the toddler was sent to the Princess Royal, in Haywards Heath.

Mr and Mrs Tiley were then told that hospital did not treat children under three, so the Royal Sussex County Hospital in Brighton was contacted - but refused to take Sydney.

She was finally operated on at a hospital in Tooting, south London, at 2230 BST - more than nine hours after she first arrived at hospital.

'Extremely angry'

Her father said: "I was disgusted - I just couldn't believe it could happen in a modern day, Western country. It just shouldn't have happened."

The Tileys came forward about their daughter's wait for treatment after seeing the case of Matthew Hudson, from Hassocks in West Sussex, reported in the media.

Matthew also had to make a 100-mile round trip to a London hospital for an operation after three hospitals in Sussex turned him away.

Mrs Tiley said: "I was extremely angry - I was disappointed and I was sorry that after our meeting with the trust, the director and executive of the trust, that then this poor boy had to experience it four days later."

A spokesman for the trust told BBC South East Today it was working to provide new facilities for children so similar cases would not occur again.