Holby City Hospital

Holby City Hospital is the fictional name of the hospital used in both Casualty and Holby City. It is based on the Bristol Royal Infirmary where the original script writers went to observe for their ideas for Casualty back in the 1980s. It used to be part of the ficitional Holby Healthcare NHS Trust which is now known as Holby City NHS Trust. The hospital is served by the fictional Holby Ambulance Service.

Although the hospital may look real, no parts are filmed in a real hospital. Holby bears a close resemblance to Bristol, and in effect would replace Bristol on the UK map. This fictional city is set in the equally fictional county of Wyvern, in the South-West of England, not far from the Welsh border.

Holby City Hospital - Casualty


Casualty is filmed in Bristol and has been for the past 21 years. The interior and exterior shots are filmed in two different places in the city, although shots make it look as if the set is complete. All the exterior shots for an episode are filmed over several days before moving into the closed set. Even though the appearance of the hospital has changed over the years, it is supposed to be the same hospital that was shown in the very first episode.

For the first series, the outside shots of the hospital were filmed in Bristol but the inside set was at BBC Television Centre in London. The exterior shots of the hospital were formerly filmed at the City of Bristol College, but are now shot on an industrial estate, not far from the interior set of the hospital. At times, people driving past the college during filming thought the hospital was real, with all the signs in place for filming, and so would drive in through the entrance only to find film equipment set up.

Holby City Hospital - Holby City


Holby City is filmed at Elstree Studios in London, despite on television being 'upstairs' from Casualty. The show which started in 1999 is a spin off from Casualty and shows the work after patients arrive from A&E.

The large building used as the entrance to the wards can sometimes be seen in background shots of Eastenders. It is not known why Holby City is not based like its sister programme Casualty in Bristol.

Characters from Holby City rarely appear in episodes of Casualty and vice versa due to the distance between filming locations and the number of episodes being produced. There have also been special episodes - Casualty@Holby City when both programmes 'crossed over'.

Notable Facts

 * The fictional telephone number for Holby City Hospital is 0117 9210018.
 * In both Casualty and Holby City, the hospital has suffered ill fate including being set on fire by riot youths and having a tanker driven into the building. The A&E department in Casualty has been rebuilt 3 times due to such events - Holby A&E Fire (1993)