Hospitals may apparently be forced to slash their services as well as the number of beds --- a situation which will likely be an upshot of the fact that "unprecedented financial challenge" that is being faced by the NHS!

The warning has come from Mike Farrar, the CEO of the NHS Confederation - the organisation which represents the UK's health service organisations including hospitals, primary care trusts, mental health trusts as well as ambulance services.

Pointing out that financial constraints are staring the health service in the face, Mike Farrar has cautioned that NHS users were seemingly not yet prepared for the scale of changes that are seemingly in the offing.

Highlighting that an uncertain future was awaiting the NHS, Farrar said that the fact that "our finances are under more strain than ever" is evident from the £20 billion in financial savings which was being targeted for the year 2015.

Expressing deep concerns that the problem was a serious one for the NHS but is not widely comprehended by the patients and the public as yet, Farrar told The Guardian that there was "a real risk" that the health service will "sleepwalk into a financial crisis" and patients will greatly affected.

Farrar said that financial crisis would clearly force the NHS to "salami-slice its way out of financial trouble, cutting services and use of less effective treatments"!