Path of Medicine With a System
chapter-106

Pulmonologist Zhu Qianqian’s only goal in life was to make lots and lots of money. Because of this, she was ridiculously miserly. In other departments, as long as the rotation doctors properly worked hard, the teaching doctor would at least reward them with small amounts of money. The teaching doctor paying for meals and drinks would be considered commonplace. Everyone knew that the new intern doctors had to work hard while receiving only meager salaries. The teaching doctors paying for the intern doctors’ food and drink equaled their recognition and acceptance of the intern doctors.

Zhu Qianqian didn’t care about any of this at all. She felt that it was only natural for the rotation doctors to have to work their hardest for very little in return. She believed that it was their fault for not having medical licenses!

Although Zhang Fan was one of the few rotation doctors who had a medical license, he didn’t mind any of this. He felt that in any profession, one should abide by the profession’s social norms (unless you were the big boss who could set the social norms yourself).

There were many Chinese southerners who came all the way out to western China to do business in Chasu City. There was an especially high number of Chinese from W Province, Henan Province, or Sichuan Province here in the border province. The W Province people typically had high-class businesses, such as transporting rare resources from the border province back to inland China, where the resources would be processed and made into goods that were sold back in the border province.

Henan people had monopolized the food sales and recycling industries in the border province. As long as one Henan person was able to successfully start a business here, it would take only a few years for an entire village of Henan people to slowly come over. They also all worked together in an especially unified manner. There were many of them who didn’t even know how to speak Mandarin Chinese ¹ , although they were extremely proficient in the Henan dialect.

The Sichuan people were experts in opening up all sorts of restaurants, including hot pot, regular fried dishes, fast food, and so on. Their restaurants’s food was considered far more delicious than the locals’ restaurants’. They were also really hardworking, and would often start working early in the morning. Meanwhile, the locals preferred to sleep in until late in the morning. By that time, the Sichuan restaurants had already done a lot of business.

China was constantly improving as a country. Without regards to other industries, China’s improvements in the medical field were quite evident. In every city, large new buildings were being constructed for hospitals every day. The most advanced medical equipment was also constantly being purchased.

Additionally, due to the previous SARS outbreak incident of China, the Chinese government began to greatly support infectious diseases hospitals. Previously, regular hospitals would have to accept patients with any type of infectious disease, but that was no longer allowed ever since the SARS incident. Any infectious disease that the Chinese government designated as Class A or Class B would have to be reported to the government, and the patient could only be treated at a specially designated infectious diseases hospital. [TL/N: see http://www.wpro.who.int/china/topics/infectious_diseases/en/ for China’s classification of infectious diseases influenced by the SARS outbreak of 2003.]

On Friday night, Zhu Qianqian and Zhang Fan were working the night shift together when a Chinese southerner from W Province came to the respiratory department for treatment. This man was a business owner. Zhu Qianqian especially loved receiving patients who came in after the regular day shift because nobody would fight over such patients with her, nor would the director tell her that she had too many patients and that she had to give the patient to another fellow doctor, as the director didn’t work night shifts.

“Hello, doctor. I’ve been feeling rather hot recently, and I also keep coughing. My phlegm also sometimes contains blood.”

This southerner spoke heavily accented Mandarin Chinese. It was somewhat difficult to understand his words.

“Let me listen to your respiratory sounds. Please have a seat. Rest assured, since you’re at a hospital, we doctors will help you with your illness. Please raise your shirt.” This southerner wore high-class clothing. Everything he had, including his wallet, was from a well-known name brand. Zhu Qianqian’s eyes were basically sparkling. This was her favorite type of patient: someone who didn’t have local medical insurance and was also really rich. This meant that the patient would choose the most expensive and best medical services.

However, Zhu Qianqian became slightly hesitant after she finished listening to the man’s respiratory sounds. She then asked in detail about his medical problems, which only made her more hesitant when she heard the results. The patient had low fevers, fatigue, and a poor appetite. She also tapped on the patient’s chest and could hear from the sounds that he was suffering from pleural effusion. With her checkup and the man’s self-identified medical problems, it became quite obvious to Zhu Qianqian just what illness this man suffered from.

It seemed apparent that this southerner also knew quite well himself that he was suffering from a Class B infectious disease, one which was supposed to be reported to the government and mandated that he go to an infectious diseases hospital. He was quite well accustomed to doctors’ social customs as he instantly handed a red packet to Zhu Qianqian along with giving Zhang Fan two boxes of smokes. Zhang Fan tried to refuse, but Zhu Qianqian stuffed the smokes into Zhang Fan’s pocket.

“Just take these smokes,” Zhu Qianqian told him. “Even if you’re not a smoker, you can always give them away to someone else to make friends with them!” She then squeezed the red packet before telling the southerner, “You probably realize already that your disease is difficult to deal with, really difficult. It’s quite troublesome for me.”

What this actually meant was that Zhu Qianqian felt that she hadn’t received enough money from the red packet. She could tell from feeling through the envelope that there had been approximately 500 yuan inside. She would be taking quite a risk by accepting this patient, and since this patient obviously seemed to be rich, Zhu Qianqian really wanted to take as much as she could from him.

“Haha, rest assured, I’ll properly thank you again after I fully recover.” The man brought out another red packet and handed it to Zhu Qianqian. He understood the Chinese medical society’s unwritten customs quite well. Since Zhang Fan was only an intern doctor in the respiratory department, he only gave him two boxes of smokes, and focused most of the bribes only on Zhu Qianqian.

“Alright then. Since that’s the case, I’ll accept you as a patient, especially because you’re an outsider who’s probably unfamiliar with the other hospitals in Chasu City. However, you have to stay in a private, individual room, and your treatment fee will be rather expensive. Do you have medical insurance?”

“Yes, but it only works for my home province. I won’t be able to use it here!”

“Then don’t use it. Your life is the most important. You’ll have everything as long as you fully recover, don’t you agree?” Zhu Qianqian was already putting on her heavy face mask.

“That’s right. Money isn’t something that can be taken with me to the afterlife. Money will be no issue at all.” The southerner was quite generous. In fact, the smokes he gave to Zhang Fan were in fancy wooden boxes. Zhang Fan had never seen such a thing before. When Zhang Fan first started working, Li Hui had lured him into trying out smoking. However, Zhang Fan had never purchased any smokes for himself before, as he only smoked when smokes were gifted to him.

There was a VIP patient room in the respiratory department, which was a large room with extravagant furnishings. In the past, you would have to have high status in order to stay here. However, regulations started tightening and social norms changed, so this VIP room was changed so that anyone with money could stay here. Just the room fee alone would cost a bit more than 300 yuan per night. It would be the equivalent of staying at a high-class hotel in Chasu City.

The southerner didn’t complain even one bit as he accepted all of Zhu Qianqian’s arrangements for him. He was especially cooperative. Zhu Qianqian was absolutely delighted as well—her income from this one patient would be equal to her average income from 10 patients combined.

Zhang Fan finished the paperwork for the patient’s preliminary checkup. Zhu Qianqian secretly removed the X-rays from the paperwork, and reminded Zhang Fan, “This patient is rather special. Whenever you’re giving him a checkup, remember to wear your heavy face mask.”

Zhang Fan was no idiot. He could identify from the patient’s symptoms that the southerner man was actually a sufferer of tuberculosis, which China had designated as a Class B infectious disease! Of course he would be extra careful about his own health around this patient.

Still, Zhang Fan was somewhat mystified. Director Jumabieke of the respiratory department was the type who liked to personally check up on the patients every day. It would be impossible for the director to miss the fact that there was now a patient staying in the special VIP room of the department. He had no idea what Zhu Qianqian was thinking. He felt that she was behaving far too recklessly, and that she was treating the hospital’s regulations as nothing more than a joke.

Unfortunately, Zhang Fan couldn’t really say anything about Zhu Qianqian’s actions. To put it nicely, he was still only a rotation doctor. To put it bluntly, he was basically here just to do menial work in the respiratory department. At least he already had his medical license. Ordinary rotation doctors who didn’t have a medical license would have to do anything they were ordered to. Anyone who had objections would be at risk of losing their job!

“I’ll personally write the medical report for this patient. You don’t need to do anything. You must be tired from the past few days of work. You can go home today now since there’s no more medical reports to write. Oh, and I’m giving you the weekend off. You won’t need to come here tomorrow or the day after tomorrow.”

Zhu Qianqian was giving Zhang Fan some time off so that she could personally deal with all the matters related to the tuberculosis patient. Zhang Fan was more than happy to take this time to rest as he had learned much from his first week in the respiratory department. He wanted to study his medical textbooks, which would help him to absorb even more knowledge. As for whatever shady business Zhu Qianqian was up to, he didn’t want to get involved. He didn’t have the power to do so, nor did he want to stick his nose into someone else’s business.

He had been too busy over the past few days, so he hadn’t even visited Shao Hua’s home. Since he was free this weekend, Zhang Fan purchased some fruits and went over to Shao Hua’s family.

After taking a family vacation together with Shao Hua’s family, Shao Hua’s father now had a much friendlier attitude towards Zhang Fan. He no longer showed such unfriendly expressions. In fact, every time that Zhang Fan came over to visit, he would insist that Zhang Fan should play Chinese chess against him.

Zhang Fan had no interest in games which weren’t played for money. He far preferred to gamble money on card games! However, Shao Hua’s father was bored with nothing to do at home, and he refused to allow Zhang Fan to go help out in the kitchen. “You’re a surgeon. Your hands are precious. If you accidentally burn or cut yourself, it’ll be such a loss if that prevents you from performing surgery for someone who needs it.”

As for playing Chinese chess, Shao Hua’s father didn’t need Zhang Fan to go easy on him. In fact, Zhang Fan was quite unskilled at playing Chinese chess. He only knew the basic rules, such as how the knight and bishop were supposed to move. It was quite common for Shao Hua’s father to achieve such overwhelming domination that Zhang Fan had no pieces apart from his king remaining. Yet, Shao Hua’s father didn’t at all mind that Zhang Fan was terrible at Chinese chess. He even derived great fun from it. It was often that he made Zhang Fan play Chinese chess against him for more than an hour at a time, which truly brought pain to Zhang Fan.

Shao Hua’s father was actually using this as a way to observe Zhang Fan’s patience and character. He wanted to see if Zhang Fan would get angry or impatient. This was all for the sake of his daughter.

Shao Hua and her mother finally finished cooking tonight’s meal, rescuing Zhang Fan from his torture. Shao Hua saw how Zhang Fan looked like he wanted to die, so she secretly squeezed his hand, instantly causing him to become energetic again.

Ever since they previously kissed in the forest, Shao Hua had avoided giving Zhang Fan any chances to have intimate contact with her. She would only occasionally peck Zhang Fan on the cheek before swiftly running away.