Path of Medicine With a System
chapter-174

It was scary how much people could slack off. When Zhang Fan had just graduated, he biked all over the provincial capital of S Province in search of a job. But just two years later, he refused to go anywhere without a car.

Zhang Fan first went to Chasu City Hospital in the morning. At noon, he went to Ma Wentao’s hospital to go check how Wang Yongyong was doing. It turned out that Wang Yongyong was recovering quite nicely. The swelling in his knee was already beginning to decrease.

Shao Hua’s cousin’s food stand began operating. Its business was quite good. The cousin’s wife’s good cooking skills were put to use. In the morning, she would steam a large number of meat buns to sell during the day. Since her food was clean and she put plenty of meat in her buns, the doctors and nurses all liked to purchase food from her. Both the cousin and his wife’s expressions brightened more and more each day. In China, money would make the world go round. Life would be really difficult without enough money.

Normally, the cousin’s wife would run the food stand, while the cousin would go work some part-time jobs outside. Both of them were nice people.

Zhang Fan was really busy. Shao Hua was also quite busy herself. It was common for the bank to request her to work overtime. Shao Hua’s cousin took over all physical work that needed to be done for the family—he absolutely insisted. This was how it was between relatives. Helping each other out would help everyone become closer and closer to each other.

Meanwhile, Chasu City Hospital’s gastrointestinal department wasn’t doing well. The previous director had retired and then been recruited by Ma Wentao. The hospital hired a new director from elsewhere, but the new director didn’t really care about his work here. The gastrointestinal department was slowly losing patients.

A hospital department’s overall abilities could be determined by public opinion. After just a few patient problems, the gastrointestinal department’s reputation became rather poor, and this department also received numerous complaints.

Superintendent Ouyang couldn’t do anything about this for the time being. There were no doctors in the gastrointestinal department skilled enough yet to become the new director. As for hiring another doctor from outside to replace the new gastrointestinal director who didn’t care about his work quality here, either the candidate doctors would feel that the conditions here weren’t good enough, or their abilities wouldn’t be good enough.

The newly hired gastrointestinal director had recently been in many discussions with Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital because this hospital had already offered to give him the position of vice superintendent as long as he went there instead. Right now, the new gastrointestinal director was using this as a negotiation chip to threaten Superintendent Ouyang. She had to increase his salary or give him a promotion. Otherwise, he would leave.

Even the superintendent of a hospital wouldn’t be able to decide by herself who could become the vice superintendent of a hospital, nor was Superintendent Ouyang able to just increase his salary. What was she supposed to tell the other directors? If one director was paid far more than the other directors, that would make all the others start complaining. Since Superintendent Ouyang didn’t agree to the new gastrointestinal director’s demands, he started stalling and only going through the motions with his work here. He had also agreed upon specific conditions with Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital already.

A rather unique female patient arrived on Tuesday for the gastrointestinal department. She had constantly been vomiting and feeling dizzy for the past three days before she had herself hospitalized.

What made her so unique was that every single checkup performed on her showed that everything should have been perfectly normal. Yet, she still felt really unwell and constantly vomited and felt dizzy. The attending physician who received this patient had no idea how to treat her. He gave a preliminary diagnosis that this might be electrolyte imbalance. The attending physician then reported the patient’s condition to the hospital administration department and requested consultation from the entire hospital.

This request was of a larger scale than normal. Usually, departments would consult each other on certain patients, but this entire hospital consultation request meant that experts from all departments were being asked to diagnose and treat the patient. Such a high-level request was something the superintendent would need to personally approve. If the request was approved, the hospital administration department would then need to arrange a time for all the expert doctors of the hospital to gather together for a discussion on the patient’s circumstances.

Superintendent Ouyang was an internal medicine expert herself. She felt that this patient’s condition really was quite strange after she personally checked the patient’s medical information. Every single checkup came back saying that the patient was perfectly normal, yet it was a fact that the patient was constantly vomiting at the hospital.

On Tuesday afternoon, expert doctors from various departments gathered together at the gastrointestinal department for an entire hospital consultation meeting regarding this patient’s condition. However, all of the doctors were quite confused by the end of the meeting. None of them were able to discover any abnormalities with the patient. No matter how much they discussed things, they were unable to come up with any good way to treat her.

“How about we invite an expert doctor from Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital? We need to help the patient,” recommended the new gastrointestinal director. He was simply watching the show and didn’t care if there was a major incident. Since he already had a good new job lined up, he didn’t even view himself as an employee of Chasu City Hospital any longer.

Chasu City Hospital had always suppressed Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital ever since the two hospitals had been constructed. Only the latter hospital would ever invite expert doctors from the former. Superintendent Ouyang would lose too much face if she had to invite a doctor from Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital.

However, there really was no good method to treat this patient at the moment. Superintendent Ouyang had a dark expression. Although lower-level hospitals would also receive patients with difficult or rare illnesses, the overall number of such illnesses would still be low.

The new gastrointestinal director had previously been a gastrointestinal vice director at the provincial hospital. Even he couldn’t tell what was wrong with the patient. However, he already had a plan. He intended on taking this patient to Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital where he would contact his former coworker at the provincial hospital to come help diagnose this patient so that he could leave an excellent first impression at Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital.

Superintendent Ouyang didn’t want to do this, so the new gastrointestinal director tried to force her into it by using words. “It’s not strange for there to be some mysterious illnesses which are difficult to diagnose. Even the provincial hospital will have some cases which are difficult to determine. However, we can’t just shut ourselves off from the world. No matter what, even if only for the sake of the patient’s health, we must gather ideas from others as well.”

His words sounded so wonderful and proper that even Superintendent Ouyang was unable to counter them. It wasn’t like she could say, “No, I won’t allow myself to lose so much face!” Nor could she say something that could be construed as looking down on Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital’s doctors. Just as she was having difficulty deciding what to do, the hospital administration director received a phone call and exited the meeting. Superintendent Ouyang watched him leave, and then said, “Let us discuss some more. Maybe there’s something we missed.”

“Haha!” The new gastrointestinal director’s laughter was filled with dripping sarcasm!

Unlike at other jobs, there was no rule about turning one’s cell phone off at a meeting between the higher-ups of the hospital. That was because of the nature of hospitals. It might be that a patient might suddenly have an emergency which would require an expert doctor’s immediate attention. That was why no director would ever have their cell phone turned off.

The gastrointestinal director’s sarcastic laughter was a direct slap in the face to all of Chasu City Hospital’s doctors. Sometimes, certain people really would be so brazen with tangible benefits and money influencing them.

The hospital administration director finished with his phone call, came back in, and smiled while whispering something to Superintendent Ouyang. She turned to look at the hospital administration director, who nodded confidently at her.

Superintendent Ouyang then spoke to the new gastrointestinal director. “There’s no need to invite a doctor from another hospital to diagnose this patient. Chasu City Hospital is already the best hospital in all of Chasu City. The patient has already been accurately diagnosed. As for you, even though you’re an expert from the provincial hospital, you’re not even trying to diagnose the patient, but rather only think about asking for help from others. I think that you’re not suitable for working at our hospital. From now on, your work contract with us is ended!”

Superintendent Ouyang had been unable to vent her anger because nobody had been able to accurately diagnose this patient. Now that this matter was taken care of, Superintendent Ouyang wasn’t afraid even if the new gastrointestinal director tried to report her to Chasu City Communist Party Committee. She’d thus spoken in an adamant and forceful tone.

The newly hired gastrointestinal director had been hired under a program to hire talented individuals which other hospitals in Chasu City didn’t have. The new gastrointestinal director had been causing trouble because he had wanted Superintendent Ouyang to release him from his work contract so that he could go work at Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital. But now, it was no longer the case of him looking down on Chasu City Hospital. He had suddenly been fired! Even if he went to Chasu City Chinese Medicine Hospital and received his position as vice superintendent there, he could never hope to be promoted any more than that in the future. That was because a fired expert doctor would no longer be viewed as an expert doctor!

“May I go meet the expert doctor who successfully diagnosed this patient?” The new gastrointestinal director already knew that the expert doctors of Chasu City Hospital had already been gathered here for this consultation meeting. He felt that it was impossible for the expert doctors here not to be able to compare to the lower-ranking doctors! That was why he wasn’t worried that this was all just an act put on by Superintendent Ouyang.

“Sure!” Superintendent Ouyang said condescendingly.

A while earlier, what happened was…

Zhang Fan returned to the oncological department and discovered that Director Anar wasn’t present. “Why are things so slow today? Where’s the director?” he asked a rotation doctor.

Since Zhang Fan had been working at another hospital earlier this morning, he at least had to notify the director when he came back.

“Boss, Director Anar is currently participating in an entire hospital consultation meeting!” Zhang Fan had a rather special position among the rotation doctors. They viewed him as an abnormal specimen.

“Haha, jokes or not, don’t refer to me like that! Which patient in which department has such a serious problem that requires an entire hospital consultation meeting?” Zhang Fan didn’t really mind the joke that much. If he minded such things, he would be exhausted to death.

“A patient from the gastrointestinal department! Zhang Fan, since you’re usually not busy, how about helping me out?” This rotation doctor was a female doctor who had graduated one year later than Zhang Fan had. However, she had joined Chasu City Hospital in the same year as Zhang Fan. She was rather pretty and was one of the more popular intern doctors.

Today, the other doctors in the oncological department were rather busy. This rotation doctor was the only one who was rather free, which was why Zhang Fan had asked her about the director’s whereabouts. However, she then kept trying to get him to do things for her sake. Zhang Fan really regretted speaking to her.

“Oh! I don’t really know if I’m good enough to help you out!”

“Look at what a coward you are. I have too many medical reports to write. I was just resting a little. See, even my fingers are getting swollen. Could you help me write a few medical reports?” she said, placing her fingers in front of Zhang Fan’s face. Her fingers were slender, white, and had a pleasant faint fragrance. She also had a cute expression and watery big eyes. No wonder there were many male doctors interested in her.

However, Zhang Fan didn’t have the time to be writing medical reports for her. If it weren’t for the fact that he’d had such a difficult time in college, along with his two years of experience after graduation, maybe he would have been seduced by her, but he had seen far too many people who were far smarter than she was over the past two years. The rotation doctor was still inexperienced.

“Oh! I just remembered that I forgot something!” This was a terrible excuse, but it was also the best excuse that Zhang Fan could think of that would convince this female intern doctor to stop trying to seduce him in the future.

Zhang Fan then went over to the gastrointestinal department since he was curious about the patient who required an entire hospital consultation meeting. Currently, his friend Hu Zengyang was one of the lead doctors in the department as the new gastrointestinal director was even stranger than the previous director. Right now, Hu Zengyang was the lead doctor for all of the major scheduled patient checkups.

Zhang Fan chuckled while asking, “Brother Hu, isn’t there an entire hospital consultation meeting? How come you’re not participating?”

He could only joke around like this because he had a friendly relationship with Hu Zengyang. Otherwise, he wouldn’t have dared to crack this joke. At the very least, one would have to have the second-highest level certification in order to join the entire hospital consultation meeting. Hu Zengyang was only an attending physician.

“Yeah! I already offered my opinion! The superintendent felt that I was correct!”

“Who the hell would believe you!”

“You little brat, you clearly knew already that I’m not high-ranking enough to participate in that meeting, yet you’re still teasing me. How come you’re here in the gastrointestinal department?”

“I missed you!”

“You’re becoming ever slyer! Where’s that good and honest Zhang Fan from before? Man, how long has it been since we last saw each other?” Although they worked at the same hospital, they were both really busy. It had indeed been a really long time since they last saw each other.

“I was busy! Which patient is the reason for such a major meeting today?” Zhang Fan got to serious business and stopped joking around.

“A patient who keeps vomiting! All of her checkups come back as normal, but she still continuously vomits,” Hu Zengyang informed him.

“That’s strange! Brother Hu, show her to me so that I can learn, ok?”

“Wait a moment for me. I need to print some papers first. Here, you can take a look at her medical information in the meantime,” Hu Zengyang told him.

Zhang Fan sat down and started looking through the patient’s medical information. The patient was a woman who was 45 years old. She was an office worker who hadn’t been seriously injured or ill recently, nor did she have any chronic illnesses. According to her own answers to the hospital’s standard questions, she didn’t drink alcohol, didn’t smoke, didn’t do drugs, and didn’t have any family history of inherited diseases.

Zhang Fan then looked through the results of the patient’s checkups. Her blood was normal. Her biochemistry, chest X-rays, and brain CT scans all seemed perfectly normal. Zhang Fan was unable to tell what was wrong, since he had yet to meet the patient.

“Let’s go meet the patient. I hear that a young brat like you is now being treated like a director?” Hu Zengyang teased Zhang Fan along the way.

“What do you mean, like a director?” Zhang Fan didn’t understand.

“Stop pretending. The whole hospital knows already that you don’t need to do anything or write medical reports in the oncological department. Isn’t that treating you like a director?”

“Oh! Look at what you’re saying!” Zhang Fan felt rather helpless about this. There would always be others who were envious. However, only ordinary people wouldn’t receive envy from others. Zhang Fan simply ignored the envy of others and continued doing what he should do.

“This is the patient in question. Take a look. She keeps vomiting intermittently,” Hu Zengyang said while pointing at a female patient who was in a private patient room.

Since this patient was special to the point of requiring an entire hospital consultation meeting, and also because the patient’s family had asked for it, she had been given an individual room of her own. Zhang Fan went into the patient’s room and immediately saw that the patient and her husband both had unpleasant expressions.

The patient and her husband were both government employees of Chasu City. The husband worked at the Bureau of Education, while the patient herself worked at the China Disabled Persons Federation. Although neither of them were high-ranking members of these government organizations, Chasu City wasn’t very large, and it was easy enough for them to at least find some connections. The patient had already been hospitalized at Chasu City Hospital for several days with no sign of any improvement. When they asked her doctor, the attending physician wasn’t even able to tell her what was wrong with her. The patient and her husband had yet to even see the gastrointestinal director come talk to them, which was why they were both in a foul mood.

“This is Doctor Zhang from our surgical department. He’s here to diagnose you,” Hu Zengyang introduced Zhang Fan to the patient.

“There’s no need to trouble you. We’ve already contacted Dee University Affiliated Hospital. We’re transferring there tomorrow.” The patient’s husband had an unfriendly tone.

“It’s no trouble at all. It’s what we should do.” Zhang Fan pretended not to understand. He even smiled at the patient and her family.

As the saying went, it would be more difficult to be angry with someone who was smiling. Since the patient and her husband both worked in Chasu City, they didn’t want to antagonize the doctors at Chasu City Hospital too much. “Alright, let him take a look then! Even your surgical directors weren’t able to diagnose what’s wrong with my wife.”

This was a common problem for educated Chinese people. Even if they were really angry, they would still really care about face. Even though the patient and her husband really didn’t want to, they could only let Zhang Fan give her another checkup for the sake of face.

On the way here, Zhang Fan had been keeping his hands warm in his pockets. This was his way of being professional as a doctor. There were many possible reasons for vomiting, but the most common reasons would be related either to the digestive tract or the brain. Zhang Fan started checking the patient from her stomach.

He found that there was nothing wrong with the patient’s liver, gall bladder, kidney, or spleen. Her stomach was soft, and she didn’t feel any pain from him exerting some pressure on the stomach. Nor did she feel any rebound tenderness.

“Have you eaten anything rather special recently, such as mushrooms?” Zhang Fan asked the patient.

“Nope!”

Zhang Fan then began to check the patient’s nerve reflexes around her brain. All of her nerves responded normally. In that case, just what could the reason be for her vomiting?

“What situations will make your vomiting worse?” Zhang Fan asked the patient.

“I feel really bad when I get a bit tired during work. I’ll even feel so dizzy that I can’t stand.”

“Ma’am, what is your job? What hobbies do you have?” Zhang Fan asked while smiling, even though he already knew her job from her medical information. He had a really friendly attitude and sincere tone. Since he was speaking so gently, the patient even began cooperating with him without realizing it despite her previous foul mood. Zhang Fan was already becoming a mature doctor who was gaining skill at talking to patients.

Zhang Fan understood why the patient and her husband would be so upset. It would be normal for anyone to be angry and anxious if the doctor was unable to properly tell them what was wrong. Zhang Fan couldn’t be angry with the patients for their attitude in such circumstances.

“I’m an office worker. I don’t really have any hobbies.”

“What’s the nature of your work? What do you usually do when you’re resting at home?”

“Ah, I mainly deal with paperwork. At home, I mostly do some sewing and so on.”

“Oh! Has the patient had an X-ray done on the neck and spine yet?” Zhang Fan asked Hu Zengyang.

“Yes!”

Zhang Fan had a serious attitude. The patient and her husband were satisfied with this, and wouldn’t complain even if he was unable to diagnose her. The patient’s husband took out the neck and spine X-ray from a table drawer in the private patient room. “The X-rays are here!”

Zhang Fan looked over the neck and spine X-ray, and was still unable to find any problems. “This is really strange!”

Zhang Fan then told the patient, “Ma’am, please lie down flat on your stomach so that I can check your spine.”

Zhang Fan then began to check her spine. When he touched her fourth cervical vertebra, he made a sound of astonishment. “Eh!?”

Zhang Fan’s ability to diagnose and rehabilitate orthopedic injuries had improved ever since he leveled up orthopedic surgery in his System.

For level 1 orthopedic surgery courses in his System, Zhang Fan had only been able to learn about common orthopedic problems. After leveling up to level 2, the orthopedic surgery courses in his System became far more specialized. Although this wasn’t the highest level of orthopedic surgery courses available in the System, these courses were already quite specialized. The System from the future had rather precise settings for these medical courses. The System required that the doctor host master every single course in level 2 before it would open up level 3 orthopedic surgery courses.

Right now, Zhang Fan had made the most progress in orthopedic surgery in his System! This was mainly because general surgery was far too deep! Zhang Fan had yet to master everything in general surgery, because there was far too much to learn!