Many trusts are finding money is tight

More than half the hospitals in England took part in the survey, and 71% of these said they had to dip into capital, or use other "one-off" sources such as the proceeds from the sale of assets to make ends meet.

On average, the trusts that responded to the survey for BBC Radio 4's Today programme, had used �2.74 million of these funds last year.

The financial pressures are happening despite a massive injection of government cash into the health service.

Wages and drugs

Trust bosses are blaming a variety of factors for their troubles.

The cost of medicines to the NHS is increasing fast, and bosses are having to find more money to cover national insurance payments and above-inflation pay rises for healthcare staff.

They also say that the pressure to meet national targets set by ministers - for example on reducing waiting times - is proving costly.

Paul Williams, president of the Institute of Healthcare Management told the BBC: "There is an irony that despite record levels of expenditure on the health service across the UK, health organisations are finding it difficult to manage within available resources.

"This is due to many factors including the need to play 'catch-up' on over 30 years of under-investment, a massive increase in expectations, new targets and policies, guidelines, increasing costs of disposables, new drugs and technology and a shortage of key staff."

He added: "The transfer of capital to revenue to help balance the books should always been the haven of last resort."

Foundation worry

John Appleby, a health analyst with the independent think tank The King's Fund, told the BBC that new "foundation hospitals" - offered extra freedoms from Whitehall - could find it harder to cope financially.

At the moment, many trusts take advantage of a "brokerage" system which allows them to borrow money from other parts of the NHS if they get into trouble.

Independence from these arrangements could make it even tougher for foundation trusts to balance the books, he said.

He said: "It isn't clear how foundation trusts would deal with financial difficulties."

Dr Liam Fox, the Shadow Health Secretary, said: "This survey shows in the starkest possible terms just how distorted the Government's priorities are.

"Hospitals are trapped. Health Ministers are determined to micromanage everything they do. They impose a one size fits all blue print which takes no account of local circumstances."

Cancelled operations

The government was criticised by the Liberal Democrats after it was revealed that the number of routine operations cancelled had risen by 22% since Labour came to power.

Health spokesman Dr Evan Harris said: "Cancelled operations are a good way of measuring whether there is enough capacity - beds and staff - in the NHS. Cancelled operations go up when capacity goes down.