Eleven patients waiting for urgent operations at Oxfordshire hospitals have been turned away for treatment in the last two months.

For two of the patients, it was the second time their surgery had been cancelled because of bed shortages at the John Radcliffe, the Churchill and Radcliffe Infirmary, and the Horton, Banbury.

Another 395 people were also told their operations had been cancelled between March 12 and May 6, with 75 being turned away in the last week of March.

The problems are the latest in a catalogue of problems being endured by managers at the Oxford Radcliffe Hospitals NHS Trust.

In February, it was revealed that the number of cancelled operations was at an all-time high.

At the time, the trust blamed the coinciding half-term holiday, when a lot of nurses on term-time-only contracts took leave to be with their families. The reduction in nurses meant beds had to be closed.

Managers claim the bed shortage is still causing problems but are carrying out measures to rectify the situation.

Trust spokesman Helen Peggs said the 11 patients turned away for urgent operations did not have life-threatening health problems.

She said: "We're recruiting nurses like mad and in the short term we are expanding one of the surgical wards to open up another eight available beds.

"Oxford Brookes nurses are about to graduate and we hope to recruit many of them. We are also in the process of building a new trauma unit, which will have another 48 surgical beds."

Managers had to promise to improve conditions at the JR casualty department, after nurses threatened to ballot for industrial action.