Middlemore Hospital where four morbidly obese patients have been stranded for months because no community facilities can take them.

Four obese patients are taking up much-needed beds at Middlemore Hospital because there's nowhere else that can take them.

The patients no longer require hospital care but their size means there's no community rehabilitation or recovery unit can take them, RNZ reports.

One of the patients, who has spinal injuries, has been in hospital for over eight months because he needs modifications to his home.

The state broadcaster reports that 18 community residential care units turned him down before he finally got accepted.

Manukau DHB's chief medical officer Gloria Johnson told RNZ that morbidly obese patients have complicated medical conditions and often need costly renovations at home that can delay their discharge.

"We've become the default place where people end up having to essentially stay for months and months on end... whilst we are attempting to find a suitable place in the community for them to move to," she said.

Private health facilities often don't have enough staff and space or reinforced floors and wide enough doors to cater for larger patients.

HANNAH MARTIN Middlemore Hospital has become the 'default place' for obese patients

The DHB's chair, Mark Gosche, said the cases showed the extent of pressure the organisation is under.

With 36,000 morbidly obese people in its catchment, the DHB has more than double the number of any other DHB.

Gosche said that statistic made the board a special case and he was asking the Government to step in with more funding.

"You've got to get your head above water. When you've got the demands of this hospital which is regularly at 100 per cent capacity or more you've got to look out into the community and say 'how are we going to lessen that'," he said.

Health Minister David Clark says the new Pacific Innovation fund is likely to include more preventive funding.