HOSPITALS in the region will be lucky if new consultants from Germany are seeing patients before the end of the year.

Dr Peter Royle, medical director of North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Trust, organised a trip to Berlin in search of specialists to fill 100 consultant posts in the region's NHS.

While Dr Royle was pleased with the careers fair, he warned that progress would not be immediate.

"The process is so slow that, if we can get them to start by the end of this year, it will be a result," said Dr Royle yesterday.

Candidates would have to be formally reinterviewed before they could be offered a position, he said.

So far, five of the 16 hospital trusts that attended the Berlin careers fair have confirmed arrangements for prospective consultants to visit them.

Three mental health trusts also attended.

Four German doctors who are interested in working as GPs in the North-East are due to visit Sunderland, which has one of the most acute shortages of family doctors in England.

Dr Royle said he believed that the German connection would play a useful role in plugging gaps until the UK could produce more of its own doctors.

"We would want to go back again, possibly to the western side of Germany next time," said Dr Royle.

About 65 doctors attended the Berlin fair and about 100 are thought to be interested in working in the Northern and Yorkshire region.

Hospital representatives from Darlington, Middlesbrough, Stockton, Hartlepool and Scarborough attended the Berlin fair, which was held in the British Embassy.