Path of Medicine With a System
chapter-74

Chapter 74: Too old to be a doctor

Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu

One week passed quite rapidly for the doctors. Zhang Fan and the others completed their parasite extermination mission, and prepared to return to Chasu City. The weather was now really hot, so it was impossible for Chasu City Hospital’s ambulances to reach the nomadic district.

While the medical team hadn’t brought much medical equipment with them, Sumutai Village was more than 100 kilometers away from Chasu City. How were they supposed to return? Walk? With Doctor Li’s poor physical condition and being lean like a beanpole, he would probably die on the way.

Zhang Fan talked this over with Munk, who waved his hand, saying, “Such a minor matter. Of course there will be a way to leave the nomadic district.” Munk then left to call for some other nomads.

Some time later, a dozen men brought over more than 20 horses. “Pick some horses! Feel free to ride any that you like!” Munk spoke quite magnanimously, but Zhang Fan and the other doctors were quite surprised by this offer.

None of the doctors knew how to ride a horse. Since it wasn’t winter, it wouldn’t be possible for the horses to pull a sled for the doctors like how Zhang Fan previously came here during winter. “That’s no problem at all. We can help you get on the horses. It’s fine as long as you sit still. They’re all female horses; they’re really obedient. We can have Bayin, Dala, and the other nomads ride other horses to lead your horses.”

“Old Munk, I don’t think this will work. These horses are too big for us. Do you have any donkeys?” Zhang Fan had some previous experience riding on donkeys. Horses here in the border province were all the large and tall type that looked quite mighty.

“Haha, where would you find a donkey out in the plains? Relax, you won’t fall off.” Munk chuckled as he saw how nervous Zhang Fan and the other doctors were.

Several strong men helped the doctors up onto the horses. Zhang Fan and the other doctors grabbed on to the saddles, while Bayin and the other nomads rode other horses while leading the reins of the doctors’ horses as they slowly proceeded. Riding a horse for a long period of time was torturous for the doctors, who all had no experience with horses.

The saddles jostled and made their butts, legs, and backs sore. Zhang Fan even started feeling like he wanted to get off and walk. The path was difficult to travel, and an ambulance finally arrived to pick them up three hours later.

Zhang Fan and the other doctors’ bodies were all stiff from the ride. Their legs were stuck apart too. Bayin then took a lot of meat off their horses’ backs. “We arrive safe, there’s a car, so we leave now. Take meat back with you.” Bayin’s Chinese wasn’t very fluent, but he had an incredibly warm and friendly expression.

Hu Zengyang hurriedly replied, “We’ve already eaten so well thanks to your hospitality. We really can’t take anything more from you, that would be wrong of us.”

“No, Munk told us to give it to you.” The burly Mongolian nomads stuffed lots of mutton, beef, and horse meat into the ambulance. Luckily, the ambulance was the larger IVECO brand. A smaller ambulance wouldn’t have been able to contain all of the meat.

After placing the meat in the ambulance, the nomads all hugged Zhang Fan and the other doctors before disappearing swiftly into the distance on the horses. “They’re real men,” Hu Zengyang commented while rubbing his butt.

The gastrointestinal department was the second largest department under internal medicine. They had many patients. The director was Wang Yonghong, an old lady who was retiring soon. She basically didn’t manage the department’s affairs anymore, and was only waiting for her retirement.

There were three vice directors of the gastrointestinal department who were all waiting for their chance to become the next director. Ouyang Hong had just been promoted to the superintendent, and she had yet to reveal any hints whom she would choose for the next department director, so all three vice directors worked incredibly hard. However, this made things difficult for the lower-ranking doctors in the department. The three vice directors would all have different requests, and it was hard to follow all three’s orders.

Hu Zengyang was a veteran attending physician with good status in the department. He felt brotherly kinship with Zhang Fan after working in the plains for a week together with him, so he directly asked Director Wang to assign Zhang Fan to his team.

There were three rotation doctors here, including Zhang Fan, two male doctors, and one female doctor. Hu Zengyang had a female patient who just passed 40 years old recently. She had cirrhosis of the liver, which then led to esophageal varices. She often coughed up blood, and was severely anemic.

Former superintendent Huang Yun had suppressed the internal medicine departments of Chasu City Hospital for the past 10 years. Apart from Ouyang Hong who managed to forcefully develop her cardiovascular department, the other internal medicine departments had received very little development. Now that Huang Yun had stepped down as superintendent, the internal medicine departments were finally getting their chance.

The new superintendent Ouyang Hong greatly encouraged the internal medicine departments to adopt new technologies. She also greatly supported the doctors going out to study new programs, along with paying for experts to come to the hospital. As if it was a competition, the gastrointestinal department’s three vice departments constantly invited expert doctors over.

No conservative treatment would possibly work on Hu Zengyang’s patient who had esophageal varices caused by cirrhosis. Zhao Cheng, the most veteran of the three vice directors, invited an expert over to perform endoscopic band ligation surgery for the patient. The provincial hospital had an old expert who was rumored to be highly skilled at performing this type of surgery. Zhao Cheng reported this, and received Ouyang Hong’s agreement and funding, so he contacted the expert.

This expert doctor from the provincial hospital had actually retired more than five years ago. Zhang Fan silently shook his head when he saw the doctor. The expert doctor was so old that he couldn’t even walk steadily anymore. How was he supposed to perform the surgery? Zhao Cheng had wanted to show off that he was a veteran who had many connections, but he didn’t expect that the expert doctor was so old.

With the expert doctor already here, it was difficult for Zhao Cheng to cancel it. The other two vice directors were now just waiting to watch a travesty!

Hu Zengyang tried to convince Zhao Cheng to simply give the old expert doctor a consultation fee for coming over, and to only perform a checkup on the patient rather than performing the endoscopic band ligation surgery. It was quite obvious to everyone that the expert doctor was now too old to perform a surgery safely; a medical incident might occur. However, Zhao Cheng refused to listen to Hu Zengyang, and gritted his teeth, insisting that the expert doctor perform the surgery.

There was no helping it. Although this patient technically belonged to Hu Zengyang, a higher-ranked doctor was taking over and making the treatment decision. Hu Zengyang couldn’t do anything about it at all. This was just how any hospital would be like. The only exception would have been if this patient was Hu Zengyang’s family member.

Zhao Cheng also invited over doctors from the general surgery department as a backup failsafe in case something went wrong.

Zhao Quanping, the director of general surgery, brought his disciple over. It just happened to be the weekend. Normally, he would be busy with patient services elsewhere. Zhao Quanping also shook his head upon seeing the situation. However, he didn’t have the authority to interfere with an internal medicine department’s decisions.

“You should leave the operating room before the surgery begins so that you have no responsibility. This is ridiculous. It will be a miracle if no medical incident occurs,” Zhao Quanping secretly whispered to Zhang Fan.

“Alright.”

The elderly expert doctor was experienced in his techniques. Although he was experienced, he was still getting too old to be a doctor. Even if he could charge a very high fee for his services, he still needed to be qualified enough to receive such a fee.

Things became bad after the endoscope entered the esophagus. The elderly expert doctor’s hands trembled severely, and the patient was also bleeding severely, which affected his field of vision. Although Zhang Fan’s System still hadn’t opened up any internal medicine courses yet, endoscopic band ligation was a type of regular general surgery that the gastrointestinal department of internal medicine also sometimes used, so Zhang Fan understood this surgery thanks to his System.

Zhang Fan shook his head to himself as he observed the surgery from outside the operating room. ‘You didn’t even drain the blood cleanly, which will obstruct your vision severely. You started ligation even in such a state? Could you be any more unreliable?’ The elderly expert doctor’s hands trembled as he performed ligation despite having his vision obscured by the patient’s blood. Heavens! He was performing ligation blindly!

Zhao Quanping told his general surgeon disciple, “Prepare for surgery.” Zhao Quanping left while shaking his head as he also prepared for surgery.

The patient entered a state of shock due to severe blood loss before the endoscopic band ligation surgery was anywhere near finished. “Give the patient octreotide and a blood transfusion!” Zhao Cheng now started panicking. Over the next 10 or so minutes, the patient was given a blood transfusion of several hundred ccs and several doses of octreotide. Money was now being spent like it was water.

“Take her to the general surgery department’s operating room. No conservative treatment will help this patient anymore,” Director Zhao Quanping of general surgery said.

The patient’s family members were absolutely stunned as they were informed of the current situation, and signed the necessary paperwork for the emergency surgery. An expert doctor was supposed to treat the patient, but now she was in such a state instead? Her state of shock was successfully dealt with, but she was still continuing to bleed.

In the general surgery department’s operating room, Zhao Quanping acted as the primary surgeon with Zhang Fan as his primary surgical assistant. “The gastrointestinal department is so reckless. It’s lucky that this patient is still relatively young. If she had been a bit older, she definitely would have died today from that medical malpractice.”

“Sigh!” Zhang Fan also felt quite helpless.

This surgery to save the patient’s life was a major surgery which required venous shunt and splenectomy, and took more than two hours to complete. Zhang Fan returned to the gastrointestinal department after he completed his assistant work on the surgery. There was a strange atmosphere in the department, and he noticed that Hu Zengyang wasn’t around.

“Where’s Doctor Hu?” Zhang Fan asked the female rotation doctor.

She looked around at the other department doctors before secretly whispering to Zhang Fan, “He was summoned by the superintendent. Vice Director Zhao was also summoned.”

While Zhang Fan had been busy with the surgery to save the patient’s life, someone unknown had called the superintendent and informed her of what happened. Ouyang Hong was absolutely furious, and immediately summoned Zhao Cheng and Hu Zengyang to her office.