More than 8,000 Buckinghamshire residents have “joined” the county’s hospital authority as part of its bid to win prestigious foundation trust status.

They will become “members” of Buckinghamshire Hospitals NHS Trust should the application for the status be successful.

Trust boss Anne Eden said public support for the application had been “overwhelming” in favour of foundation status.

This would give the authority freedoms such as the right to keep cash surpluses and let “members” have a say on how it is run.

Yet Ms Eden said more members were being sought for the application, which would need to be approved by the Government and foundation trust regulator Monitor.

A major public consultation on the plans, including trust-led public meetings, was held between July and October.

Ms Eden said: “Overall, the support for foundation trust was overwhelming.”

She said: “I am delighted to say we already have a membership of over 8,000.

“We are not satisfied with that, we think there is a way to go but we think that is pretty impressive at this stage.”

Some initial plans for how the new look authority would be governed have been changed as a result of the consultation.

Under the foundation trust model the trust would still be managed by a board but this would be scrutinised by a “council of governors” including residents and staff.

Members could put concerns to governors to pass onto the trust board.

Managers yesterday approved plans to change the make-up of this council after concerns some areas and professions were not represented enough.

This will see the number of Wycombe and Aylesbury district governors rise from three to four and two nurses, midwives or healthcare assistants instead of one.

This group now has most governors compared to other types of staff such as doctors.

But a proposal to lower the minimum age for members from 18 to 16 was not agreed by the board.

This is because it does not provide specialist children’s services, there was not a “well defined group” for under 18s and 18 was an age adults are given most of their responsibilities.

An outstanding issue, however, is radical new proposals for the trust to take over the management of services provided by Buckinghamshire NHS Primary Care Trust.

These are community-based services such as district nurses. The move would create an organisation similar to old style health authorities which ran a wider range of services.

The key difference is the PCT would still decide where NHS should be spent, a hallmark of the introduction of market forces into the NHS in the 1990s.

The hospital trust wants to make sure this transfer would not cause of problem for its application to become a foundation trust.

Ms Eden said: “We really needed to evaluate the opportunities but also the risks associated with taking on the provider services.”

To apply to become a member of the proposed foundation trust and to read other stories about the issue see the links on the right.