Path of Medicine With a System
chapter-53

Director Zhao Jun of the hepatobiliary department was the type who would almost never personally participate in ordinary minor surgeries. As for major surgeries, he had no reason to ask a lowly resident doctor if he knew how to do them. Thus, Zhang Fan was incredibly bored from being teamed up with the director. All that Zhang Fan ever got to do was hold the surgical retractors. Several of the medical specialist doctors would vigorously fight over getting to do the surgical sutures, so Zhang Fan didn’t join in. There were some medical specialist doctors who had previously been forced into the internal medicine department. Under Ouyang Hong’s new policy of rotating departments for new doctors, they now saw more hope for their future, so these new doctors were all highly motivated.

It also so happened that there were very few emergency department patients that required hepatobiliary surgery, so staying in the emergency department wouldn’t help Zhang Fan get the chance to perform more surgeries. He had nothing to do every day. Everyone else in the hepatobiliary department was very busy, but Zhang Fan was the only one with nothing to do. He couldn’t even go help patients change the medicine, because the medical specialist doctors here were quite hardworking. They would finish their work as quickly as possible since they were afraid of losing this opportunity.

Every day, Zhang Fan either studied his medical textbooks or performed outpatient services. He would go massage Li Xiao after his work shift, and then he would literally have nothing to do. Zhang Fan was really regretting not having purchased airplane tickets to go back and visit his family for New Year’s. By now, there were no longer any tickets available even if he wanted to buy some.

Today, right when Zhang Fan finished outpatient services, he received a phone call from the boxing teacher Wu Yanchao. “Doctor Zhang, do you still remember me? I’m Guli’s teacher, Wu Yanchao. Are you able to come to our school when you have some free time?”

This was perfect—Zhang Fan was incredibly bored. Only now did he remember that he had agreed to go visit the sports school on occasion, but he hadn’t gone even once yet. He hurriedly responded, “Hello, Teacher Wu. Of course I remember you. I was in Kuake City for the past month for the government program supporting rural hospitals, and just came back a few days ago. I happen to be free this afternoon, would it be alright if I come today?”

“That sounds great. I’ll wait for you at the school entrance, then. Approximately at what time will you be coming over today?”

Zhang Fan said a time, and then hastily went over to the hospital cafeteria to eat some lunch.

This afternoon, Director Zhao Jun was working at another hospital as a guest doctor, so he wouldn’t be in the hepatobiliary department. Thus, Zhang Fan directly drove his car to the sports school.

This Chasu City sports school wasn’t that large. In China, going through the education system and getting into a good college was considered the proper way of doing things. Practicing sports, especially for the sake of becoming a professional athlete in the future, was rarely supported by Chinese parents. They considered sports too cruel on the body, with too many uncertainties.

Wu Yanchao showed Zhang Fan where he could park his car. As they walked towards the training room, Wu Yanchao introduced some aspects of the sports school. “The children here are mostly 11 or 12 years old. The oldest ones here are only 15 years old at most. Those who are talented and have accomplishments will be chosen to go to the provincial sports school by the time that they’re older. Those who can’t make any accomplishments will also start thinking of other future paths aside from sports.”

This sports school had several different sports options to learn that students could choose from. The sports were all sports that could be practiced here. For instance, swimming wasn’t an available option here, because swimming pools were too expensive for the school to afford. Wu Yanchao had some boxing students, and he also taught basketball as well as football. Since the sports school didn’t have very many teachers, all of the teachers taught multiple different sports.

Guli was still resting at home. She still hadn’t recovered 100% yet, so she was unable to join the training. Zhang Fan watched the children train. To be honest, he felt that it was very difficult. Those children had to be quite persistent, being able to go through all this.

“Hey everyone, come over here. Let me introduce Doctor Zhang from Chasu City Hospital to all of you. He’s an orthopedic surgeon who performed the surgery for Guli. Doctor Zhang will be visiting us regularly in the future. Now, let us all give him a warm welcome.” Wu Yanchao gathered all the students and introduced Zhang Fan.

“Hello.” Zhang Fan had no idea what he should say to all these children, so he greeted them very simply.

The children were quite passionate, and almost simultaneously shouted, “Nice to meet you, Doctor Zhang!” Those who practiced sports almost always had extroverted personalities. Perhaps this was a benefit of strengthening the body. Have you ever heard of an athlete who had depression~?

After introducing Zhang Fan, Wu Yanchao had the children form a line to receive a checkup from Zhang Fan one by one. Although these children were still young, all of them already had evident muscles. Zhang Fan mostly checked for signs of joint damage, previous damage from pulled muscles, and so on. It took Zhang Fan 90 minutes to finish giving a checkup to every child.

The situation didn’t seem good. Just about all the children had previously been lightly or seriously injured before, and some of them even had obvious injuries that would affect their future development.

“Very few of our children are able to become professional athletes in the future. Most of them will go test for China’s second-level athlete certification in the future, and it’s likely that their scores will be slightly lower than average. The great majority of them will probably find work as physical education teachers when they’re adults,” Wu Yanchao explained to Zhang Fan. He then showed Zhang Fan the sports school’s infirmary. “Previously, we hired a nurse to staff this infirmary, but she’s currently taking time off because she’s pregnant, so now the infirmary is empty. We do have a few children here who are especially talented, which is why I wanted Doctor Zhang to come over and help us with professional advice and care.”

“Sure, that’s not a problem.”

Zhang Fan began treating, massaging, and prescribing medicine to the children according to their symptoms. This was how he spent the entire afternoon. As for the children with more serious previously undiagnosed injuries, he gave them advice on what rehabilitative exercises they could perform. Although some of these injuries had occurred quite a while ago, fortunately the children were still young, and had flexible bodies. It was likely that they could still recover.

The sports school principal heard from Wu Yanchao that a professional doctor had been invited over to help treat the children, and hurried over at this time.

“This is our school’s principal. This is Doctor Zhang, a doctor from Chasu City Hospital,” Wu Yanchao introduced them to each other. Although Zhang Fan was quite young, Chasu City Hospital was quite well known in the local area.

The school principal was a middle-aged man who appeared to be in his forties. He was stocky and muscular, so it was obvious that he often trained his body. The school principal shook Zhang Fan’s hand, saying, “I’m truly grateful to Doctor Zhang. Our sports school’s conditions are rather poor, so it’s common for the children to accidentally injure themselves during training. Previously, I heard from Teacher Wu that you’re a professional orthopedic surgeon. I’m truly so thankful that you’re able to visit our school.”

The sports school’s funding was quite limited. The school principal felt too awkward to mention this. A few minutes later, he had a large red certificate brought over. Zhang Fan didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when he saw what was written on the certificate. “Our school shall hire Zhang Fan to be the school’s health consultant.” The school principal was afraid that Zhang Fan would only come this one time, which was why he hastily had this certificate made. The principal also felt awkward about this, so he rubbed his hands, and said, “Our school is like an orphan in the eyes of the Bureau of Education. It’s fine to them as long as we get enough money to keep running, and our funding is often taken away by others. Just look at this building, it was even funded by the Soviets. I truly can’t help it. Please understand.”

“Don’t worry. I also enjoy sports. You don’t need to do anything. I’ll come over whenever I have time.”

After this, Wu Yanchao wanted to treat Zhang Fan to a meal, but Zhang Fan had to refuse because he needed to go give Li Xiao a massage treatment. Li Xiao would be finishing the second of her three rehabilitative massage treatments soon in a few days. Zhang Fan decided to have Li Xiao’s muscles rest for a while afterwards, and for her to have a new CT scan done before planning the third treatment.

Zhang Fan’s younger sister Zhang Jingshu phoned him, and asked if he was going to return to his family for New Year’s this year. She was slightly sad to find out that he wouldn’t be returning yet again this year. She hadn’t seen her older brother for a year and a half now, and really missed him. Zhang Jingshu knew that her high school tuition and living expenses were all being paid for by her older brother.

Zhang Jingshu was quite a good student who had constantly been ranked in the top three in her school. Although her school was a smaller one, with her grades, she really did have hope for testing into the top colleges in China.

It was now almost New Year’s. Zhang Fan had spent last New Year’s in Kuake City, but his quality of life had significantly improved here in Chasu City. He no longer felt as pressured as when he’d just arrived in Kuake City.

Zhang Fan drove to the largest mall in Chasu City. He had made good money this year, so he purchased a nice set of clothes for both his parents as well as his younger sister. He then wired more than 5000 yuan to his younger sister.

Last year, Wang Qian had given Zhang Fan a large bag of gifts for New Year’s. This year, she especially brought her gifts all the way over to Zhang Fan’s apartment.

“Your place is pretty clean and tidy, but it’s really empty. You don’t even have a television or laundry machine. Okay, accompany me to the mall. I’ll help get you some things to spruce up your place. It’s the New Year’s, so shouldn’t you have a new atmosphere? Besides, Kang Hua also wants to thank you!”

“Sister Wang, there’s truly no need to go to all that trouble. I spend almost all day at the hospital every day, so I don’t need something like a television. It’s fine as long as both of you have recovered. There’s no need to be so polite with me.”

“Silly child, Kang Hua has been promoted. She’s become the acting city leader of Chark City.”

“Oh? But, she doesn’t need to thank me for that. I don’t have anything to do with it.”

Wang Qian smiled mysteriously before saying jokingly, “It’s all because you were good at playing the Double Rise card game. I can easily tell that you still don’t know who Li Xiao really is.” Wang Qian then told Zhang Fan about Li Xiao’s identity and background.

“Oh, I see how it is. No wonder the new superintendent at my hospital called me over for a private chat in her office right after Sister Li gave a phone call to our superintendent.”

“Why else did you think Li Xiao had so much influence? Okay, let’s not waste time, we should leave now. The mall will be really crowded since it’s almost New Year’s.” With Wang Qian’s identity, obviously she would only pay by card to purchase anything, and she had a VIP membership at the mall.