THE NHS is facing criticism from charities, patients and staff after spending £1,245 on glossy postcards reminding NHS employees not to share their computer passwords.

The cards read "Greetings from Spain" on the front as though they are actual postcards from abroad.

And the message on the back is written in the style of a holiday-maker named Danny, which starts: "Hi Team, wish you were here!"

"Danny" then goes on to ask his team to log on to his computer using the password 'access all areas'.

A spokeswoman for NHS East Midlands, which is behind the campaign, said the idea was to encourage staff to think about keeping information such as passwords private.

But an employee of Derby's hospitals, who wished to remain anonymous, said the message was unclear and the cards were "an outrageous waste of money".

The staff member added: "How ridiculous is this card and what exactly is it trying to say or achieve? Why could this not have been sent via e-mail?"

Katy Pugh, chief executive of Age Concern Derbyshire, said the money would be better spent on frontline health services for patients. She said: "As a manager I can understand the need to reinforce the message about data protection.

"I'm not convinced that a cryptic postcard is the best way to do it.

"We tend to find that having training or holding a team meeting is the best way to do it, and that's pretty much free."

The cards were also criticised by Jane Richardson, of The Hill, Cromford, whose husband, Ian Bowers, has been unable to get NHS funding to pay for a cancer drug.

The couple have spent £12,068 on Sunitinib, also known as Sutent, to treat dozens of tumours on Mr Bower's lungs caused by a rare cancer.

His wife, who formerly worked as an occupational therapist in Derbyshire, said: "There's a lot of waste in the system and this is a classic example.

"I worked in the NHS for 15 years and one of the reasons I left was because of all the waste."

The cards have been distributed to 24 local NHS organisations, which together employ 112,116 staff.

The NHS East Midlands spokeswoman said 10,000 postcards had been printed to catch the attention of staff who could not easily be reached in other ways, such as those without regular access to e-mail.

She said: "The cost of the postcards was £1,245, which works out at around 0.01p per member of NHS staff in the region. Patient confidentiality is vital. Patients should expect nothing less than their private details to be safe with us."