Health Correspondent Barry Nelson considers the legacy of Alan Milburn, who has spent a high-pressure three years and eight months at the helm of the health service supertanker.

RIGHT from the start of his relatively long tenure at the Department of Health, Alan Milburn has stressed that the task of reviving the NHS will probably take decades rather than years. But New Labour knows only too well that public expectations have been raised and the electorate will expect to see clear improvements in the nation's health service by the time of the next election.

Whether the voters and the party will blame the Darlington MP if his massive investment programme fails to have an impact on healthcare is anyone's guess. But there is no doubt that many people will judge the Government on whether it has kept its promise to revive the NHS and the verdict at the polls at the next election will largely reflect the success or failure of Alan Milburn's long period of leadership.

So what state has the Honourable Member for Darlington left the Health Service in?

It's fashionable to be cynical about claims by politicians - and there is certainly a fierce party political debate whether some of Labour's impressive health statistics stand up to close analysis - but if you talk to health professionals who work in the North-East they will tell you that resources have undoubtedly increased during the Milburn years.

In one high-profile area there has been a dramatic turnaround.

Shortly after he became Health Secretary in October 1999 he announced he was making services for coronary heart disease one of his priority areas for improvement.

That decision, partly inspired by The Northern Echo's A Chance To Live campaign, has led to a dramatic reduction in the length of time people wait for heart surgery. Instead of waiting 18 months for bypass surgery, patients now wait for an average of nine months and that is due to fall to three months within the year.

But that is just one area of the NHS. While acknowledging a renaissance is under way there is real concern among health workers at the increased pace of work, the increasingly demanding targets set by government and the ever-increasing expectations of patients.

There is also a deep irritation among many health workers at the endless re-organisation which has led to jokes about Mr Milburn being in favour of "permanent revolution" like the infamous Bolshevik leader, Trotsky.

And some front-line doctors mutter darkly about the number of managers who seem to be proliferating throughout the NHS.

The most obvious physical signs of the regeneration in the region is the hospital building programme, although it has been dogged with controversy that the unpopular private finance initiative now used to build virtually all new NHS hospitals may have led to the number of beds being reduced because of the high cost of repayments.

Brand new district general hospitals have appeared at Durham, Bishop Auckland and Hexham while major revamps are well underway to extend and modernise major regional hospitals in Newcastle and Middlesbrough.

At the other end of the size scale new community hospitals are being created at Sedgefield, Teesdale and Weardale and a new mental hospital is being built in Darlington.

So much for the North-East - what about the bigger picture?

If you visit the Labour Party website and look under health, the figures are undoubtedly impressive, with spending on the NHS rising from the equivalent of £2,370 per household last year to a projected figure of £4,060 per household in 2007-8, a 48 per cent real terms increase.

Using official Department of Health figures, Labour point to 68 new hospitals completed, underway or approved since they came to power in 1997.

The party also boasts that the NHS now has 5,000 more consultants and 39,500 extra nurses since 1997, some of them flown in from Spain and the Philippines after Mr Milburn announced an aggressive programme of overseas recruitment.

Broadly speaking, the NHS under Alan Milburn is treating more patients more quickly but the worrying thing for his successor is that an ageing population with worsening health will place an increasing burden on the Health Service which may have to run to stand still. Even though Alan Milburn has secured a major increase in funding for the NHS, the major worry for the modernising wing of New Labour is finding someone who can push through the reforms which the Darlington MP has loudly championed in recent years.

Over and over again, Mr Milburn has repeated the mantra that radical reforms need to go hand in hand with extra investment, and in recent months the push to modernise has met strong resistance. His conviction that the NHS must reform or die has led him into clashes with vested interests such as the British Medical Association and the health service workers Unison.

But the toughest fight - and one which the County Durham MP seemed to relish - was over the introduction of foundation hospitals.

Who would have thought that within a few months of stoutly defending his controversial vision of foundation hospitals against the Labour Left, Mr Milburn would be returning to their midst on the House of Commons backbenches. Tony Blair must be dismayed at the prospect of finding a tough politician who can finish the job started by his close colleague Alan Milburn. One thing is certain, nearly four years after Mr Milburn took over, the NHS is now in a better position than when he assumed control.