As BBC1's Casualty hits its 400th episode, Steve Pratt revisits some of the nation's favourite TV hospitals

Blame it on Tessa Diamond, the TV continuity writer who suggested "something about doctors and nurses" to fill the empty 7.30pm slot on ITV back in 1957. The result was British television's first twice-weekly soap, Emergency - Ward 10, which featured the doctors, nurses and patients in Oxbridge General Hospital.

Nearly half a century later, the viewing public shows no sign of losing its appetite for the life and death happenings in hospital in all their blood and guts glory.

While the National Health Service may be in a state of crisis, TV visits to the accident and emergency department and the wards are as popular as ever.

After 17 years of diagnosing every ailment under the sun, Casualty workers are still wheeling in and dealing with patients. Occasionally, they get treated without the waiting area being the scene for a gun siege, matrimonial spat, drug-related crime or just Charlie having a paddy.

Tonight's 400th episode of Casualty ends the current series on an explosive cliffhanger, leaving the audience to wonder who'll be back for the new series in the autumn.

How much cosier things were back in the gentler days of Emergency - Ward 10. Then patient deaths were limited to five a year, and even that was later reduced to just two. No worrying or incurable illnesses were allowed.

Nowadays hospital dramas like Casualty and its spin-off Holby City have patients losing their lives or their limbs with alarming regularity. The writers wouldn't know what to do if they weren't allowed to investigate issues such as domestic abuse, drug addiction and fatal illnesses.

The pleasure for viewers is being able to watch the misfortunes of others from a safe distance, as handsome doctors demonstrate an impeccable bedside manner with nurses who look good in uniform and even glamorous carrying overflowing bedpans.

How ironic that the latest addition to the TV hospital series, The Royal, takes us full circle. Back to the Sixties, just a few years after Emergency - Ward 10 began, to a time when matron was as starchy as her uniform and doctors had time to chat about the weather as well as ailments.

As Casualty goes out, temporarily, with a bang, it's time to revisit some other hospitals on the box.

MIDLAND GENERAL HOSPITAL

Here you'd find some familiar faces, including Oxo mum Lynda Bellingham and Crossroads favourite Adam Chance, actor Tony Adams, in General Hospital in the 1970s. This took its title from the long-running American soap and was Emergency - Ward 10 by any other name.

HENRY PARK HOSPITAL

Tom Baker, a doctor of a different kind as Doctor Who, played the eccentric professor of surgery, Geoffrey Hoyt, in Medics. Sue Johnston, fresh from playing Sheila Grant in Brookside, was the harassed chief executive dealing with NHS politics. Coronation Street's devious Dev, Jimmi Harksihin, was among the docs on duty.

ST ANGELA'S HOSPITAL,

BATTERSEA

Student nurses learnt ward duties in Angels, created by Julia Smith, who went on to invent EastEnders. Three of them - Shirley Cheriton, Kathryn Apanowicz and Judith Jacobs - later turned up in Albert Square in different guises.

BRITISH HOSPITAL

EMERGENCY UNIT

Written by real life junior hospital doctor John MacUre, Cardiac Arrest had the smell of a real hospital as overworked casualty medics tried to keep their eyes open as they treated patients. Among them was Helen Baxendale in the days before she starred in Cold Feet.

GILLIES HOSPITAL

Dr Sheila Sabatini (Nichola McAuliffe) was noted as a surgeon with a tongue as sharp as her scapel in a series Surgical Spirit, one of the few medical series that played it for laughs.

ST SWITHIN'S HOSPITAL

More laughter on the wards as this teaching hospital in Doctor In The House was the scene for comic capers by medical students led by Michael Upton (Barry Evans) and Duncan Waring (Robin Nedwell), based on characters in Richard Gordon's Doctor books.

ST VICTOR'S HOSPITAL

Scene of homegrown medical drama AandE with Martin Shaw and Michael Kitchen representing the doctors, and Niamh Cusack and Jane Danson leading the nursing staff.

CHICAGO COUNTY

GENERAL HOSPITAL

The Level One Trauma Centre is the scene for the Emmy Award-winning ER, created by Jurassic Park author Michael Crichton and based on his own experiences as a medical student. George Clooney, Anthony Edwards and Noah Wyle have been on duty in the emergency room of this Chicago hospital series, now in its ninth series.

BLAIR GENERAL HOSPITAL

Heart-throb Dr Kildare, a young intern at a large metropolitan hospital, set hearts fluttering with his well-groomed good looks, as personified by Richard Chamberlain after William (Captain Kirk) Shatner turned down the part. Veteran actor Raymond Massey was his mentor, Dr Leonard Gillespie.

COUNTY GENERAL HOSPITAL

Resident neurosurgeon Ben Casey was a Sixties doctor who was tougher and more rebellious than squeaky clean Dr Kildare. Vince Edwards played him, with Sam Jaffe as Dr Zorba in a programme which opened each episode with the words "Man, woman. Birth, death. Infinity... ".

* The 400th episode of Casualty brings the current series to an end at 8.20pm on BBC1 tonight.

Holby City continues on BBC1 at 8pm on Tuesday. ER is on C4 on Wednesday at 9pm.

Published: 21/06/2003