History of the National Health Service Emergency Ward 10 was first broadcast in 1957 on ITV and ran until 1967 and followed the life and loves of the staff and patients of the fictionalised Oxbridge General. ITV later followed this up with General Hospital which borrowed much from Emergency Ward 10 in terms of its themes and focus. The idea of a medical hospital as a suitable and popular setting for a soap opera continued to take root in the 1980s. Casualty, set in an A&E department, was first broadcast in 1986 and has since become the longest running medical drama in the world. At a
Soap Opera Digest and Ritterman earned a handful of Daytime Emmy Award nominations, with Dick Clark Productions, for co executive producing the "Soap Opera Digest" Awards. "Soap Opera Digest" coined the term and popularized the use of "soap speak," in which show names are abbreviated as acronyms to save space. These abbreviations have come into more extensive use outside the magazine with the advent of internet chat rooms and message boards. For example, current soap operas and their acronyms include "General Hospital" ("GH"), "The Bold and the Beautiful" ("B&B"), and "The Young and the Restless" ("Y&R"). "Days of Our Lives" is referred to