A FERTILITY clinic which is to close because it can't recruit staff only advertised the current vacancy for a single week, a trade union has claimed.

However North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust has insisted "every effort" was made "for some time" to recruit staff for the Hartlepool clinic.

The Trust announced last week it is to close its IVF and fertility treatment unit which rivalled Harley Street success rates and provided 250 cycles of treatment a year on Teesside.

Now the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) has queried the Trust's reasoning, saying only one job advert was made for an embryologist in September on the NHS Jobs website.

Sarah Dodsworth, RCN Northern regional director said: “The trust has stated that one of the main reasons for closing the unit is because they are struggling to recruit to the position of embryologist. And yet, they were successful at recruiting to this post as recently as May 2015.

“Since the post became vacant, they have only advertised the position once, in September, and even then it was only advertised on the NHS jobs website for a week.

“To abolish a successful, high quality unit, and put a number of our members - who are excellent nurses - at risk of redundancy based on a failure to recruit to a post after advertising it only for a week, is clearly unacceptable. The trust must put this decision on hold until it undertakes a full and transparent consultation with the broader community and stakeholders.”

A North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust spokesman said: “We have made every effort for some time to recruit.

“All of our vacancies are advertised on NHS Jobs, which is a dedicated online recruitment service for the NHS. All jobs advertised can be accessed from overseas. Candidates are shortlisted only when they meet the criteria.”