Healing Doctor

Chapter 114 Learning

The head nurse peered through the gap behind Director Zhao's husband, her eyes filled with worry.

Fortunately, both of them were dressed, so it seems like no one will die.

However, they were a bit strange.

Professor Ma lay on the computer console, while Director Zhao held a micro-guidewire and was simulating a puncture procedure through the femoral artery.

Because it's just a rough simulation, it looks particularly clumsy, funny, and strange.

Professor Ma was also holding a hollow, special microcatheter with a guidewire running through it, and he had even twisted the tube several times.

Practicing skills in the middle of the night?

No way! If they were that dedicated, how come, apart from the four top surgeons, no one else in the department has surgeries that are truly outstanding?

The head nurse was suspicious.

Director Zhao was startled. He turned around and saw his wife. He frowned and asked, "What are you howling about in the middle of the night?"

"What are you doing!" Director Zhao's wife asked, realizing she had misunderstood.

"Learn the skills." Director Zhao stood ramrod straight, coldly looking at his wife. "Go back, you stupid woman."

Director Zhao's wife's lips moved as if she wanted to retort, but lacking conviction and confidence, she immediately backed down.

"Director, I thought you were drunk and sleeping somewhere. What are you doing here?" The head nurse asked as she walked over after seeing that everything was alright.

"Just now, Xiao Li is here. Find me a USB drive," Director Zhao instructed habitually.

"Okay."

"What do you need the USB drive for?" Director Zhao's wife asked, puzzled.

"Mind your own business!" Director Zhao glared at his beloved wife. He knew why she had come when he was startled, and he decided to take this opportunity to give her a good talking-to.

"You understand, right?"

After being rebuked a few times, Director Zhao's wife was speechless.

"Go back right now, you're making a fool of yourself," Director Zhao scolded. "I'm learning something, what are you doing here in the middle of the night?"

"At this age, what's the point of learning anything?" Director Zhao's wife muttered softly.

"You're never too old to learn, you wouldn't understand even if I told you," Director Zhao waved his hand, slightly impatient.

"As if you know it."

Soon, the head nurse brought the USB drive.

"Head Nurse, I don't know how to do this. Could you send me an email with the copied video later?" Director Zhao said.

"To whom should it be sent?"

"Go to Xiao Sui in Ningbo," Director Zhao said.

Professor Sui was one of the four top experts back then. He was quite skilled and had a good relationship with Director Zhao.

"I need Xiao Sui to take a look at it. I feel like today's surgery was done well, but it's almost too good."

The head nurse was taken aback. Was Director Zhao praising himself?

He must have drunk too much, otherwise he wouldn't have said such shameless things.

Normally, when Director Zhao performs a particularly impressive surgery, he would subtly tell everyone, trying to be modest. But today, he accidentally blurted out the truth.

……

……

Director Liu sat in his office with a solemn expression.

Ji Xiang's behavior today was very abnormal, an extremely rare instance of him being disrespectful to his superiors, which is quite taboo in the medical field.

Director Liu also knew that young people tend to have bad tempers.

A few years ago, a new junior doctor in the gastrointestinal surgery department got angry over a minor incident of shifting blame in clinical practice. He took off his name tag and threw it in the face of the head of the gastrointestinal surgery department, without even submitting a resignation letter.

This is truly speechless; at least Director Liu wouldn't have dared to do this when he was young.

However, Ji Xiang went even further than that junior doctor, giving Director Zhao of the Interventional Radiology Department a thorough dressing-down, which even Director Liu couldn't stand.

Director Liu did not react on the spot; he was quite shrewd and never showed his emotions.

But that's not the point. If it were a regular resident trainee acting this "outrageously," Director Liu would have already yelled at them. But Director Zhao was acting like a grandson, which made Director Liu swallow back the words he wanted to say several times.

Director Liu knew Director Zhao quite well; he had a terrible temper, and Director Liu had to be very careful to keep a smiling face around him.

Although he will definitely "help" stop the bleeding, it is inevitable that he will undergo a thorough self-examination before and after the operation, which has become a routine.

Unlike today.

Director Liu asked the nurse for a glass of apple juice and then returned to his office.

He blew on the foam on the apple juice, took a sip, and didn't care at all whether it looked like urine or not. He even ignored the impurities that resembled kidney stones.

Lighting a cigarette, Director Liu went over the events of the day again, still feeling that something was amiss.

Could it be that Old Zhao knows something? No, even if he were the dean's son, Zhao Xiangming probably wouldn't be able to stand being pointed at and cursed like that.

eccentric.

Director Liu made a quick decision; he was prepared to follow the clues and find the source.

If Ji Xiang doesn't have any connections, and it's just because he's young and reckless, plus Director Zhao is drunk, then tomorrow morning I'll take Ji Xiang to apologize.

But if...

Director Liu did not continue thinking about it, but instead began to implement it.

He found a familiar clerk in the Science and Education Department. The clerk's father often came to him for bladder irrigation after bladder cancer surgery, and the two were quite familiar with each other. He didn't usually need anything from the clerk, so when Director Liu asked for Ji Xiang's academic records, the clerk readily agreed.

An hour later, Ji Xiang's student registration information was delivered to Director Liu's office.

It was already quite late. After exchanging pleasantries with the other person, Director Liu began to discuss Ji Xiang's school.

SYS University, a 985 university in China, is indeed excellent.

Director Liu had a classmate in Guangzhou. It took Director Liu a lot of effort and many roundabout methods to finally contact the counselor at Jixiang School.

After creating a group chat, the professor from Guangzhou gave a brief introduction, and disappeared after confirming everything was correct. Director Liu then dialed the counselor's number.

"Director Zheng, I'm sorry to bother you so late," Director Liu said politely.

"Director Liu, you're too kind. I'm just a counselor. Don't call me 'Director Zheng,' it sounds like I'm some big shot in the clinical department," the counselor said cheerfully. "Director Liu, what can I do for you?"

"Is Ji Xiang a student in your class?"

"Yes." The counselor became interested when Ji Xiang was mentioned. "Director Liu, is Ji Xiang doing his residency training with you?"

"Yes."

"Isn't it eye-opening!" the counselor exclaimed excitedly.

Director Liu could sense the counselor's emotional change. He paused for a moment, then organized his thoughts.

Just then, the counselor said, "During his clinical internship, the professors at the affiliated hospital took a liking to Ji Xiang. He had a solid foundation and strong hands-on skills, but... he went home, which is a real pity."

"Did you offend some professor because of your bad temper?" Director Liu asked tentatively.

"How could that be! Professor Chen in our department, who receives a special allowance from the State Council, couldn't even keep Ji Xiang." The counselor immediately defended Ji Xiang, "Besides, Ji Xiang has a very gentle temperament and respects his teachers. He would never offend the professor."

"..."

Director Liu was stunned.

The Ji Xiang described by the counselor seemed to be somewhat different from what I knew.

He recalled that Ji Xiang was indeed very docile when he asked him questions, which was completely different from when he was performing surgery today.

"Director Zheng, is there something wrong with Ji Xiang...?"

"Director Liu, what exactly do you mean?"

When Ji Xiang was mentioned, even if it was just a hint of bad news, Ji Xiang's counselor across from him became unhappy, and his voice turned stern.

"Does Ji Xiang usually not argue?"

"No, not even once."

Director Liu hesitated for a moment, then said directly, "Let me put it this way, I have an emergency surgery today that requires the interventional radiology department's assistance. But the head of the interventional radiology department has had too much to drink, and Dr. Ji's performance..."

At this point, Director Liu suddenly froze.

He had absolutely no idea how to describe Ji Xiang.

"Things today are strange, Director Zheng. We're all on the same side, so I'll just ask directly and not beat around the bush," Director Liu said. "Is Ji Xiang's family some big shot in the medical field?"

Director Liu found the question absurd.

Which big shot would send their own child here? If they had that kind of ability, wouldn't Ivy League schools, Peking Union Medical College, and Peking University be much better?

Director Liu didn't know what to say, but after asking the question, there was silence on the other end of the phone.

There was silence on the other end for a long time, and in the end, without saying a word, they hung up the phone.

Director Liu was stunned.

What's going on?!

But the more this was the case, the more certain he became that his guess was correct.

Otherwise, Ji Xiang's counselor wouldn't have acted so strangely.

Director Liu took out another cigarette, but realized he had smoked too much that day, so he held the cigarette in his mouth for a long time without lighting it.

The phone suddenly rang, startling Director Liu, who was deep in thought.

Seeing that the caller was his classmate from the south, he frowned and answered the phone.

"Old Liu, you just... never mind that, Instructor Zheng asked me to pass on a message to you."

"what?"

"Ji Xiang is a good young man with a bright future. If possible, he suggests you treat Ji Xiang better," said Director Liu's classmate seriously.

"I see."

"Old Liu, you've really struck gold!" Liu's classmate exclaimed. "I don't know about other things, but a few months ago, several well-known experts from the First Affiliated Hospital of Sun Yat-sen University expressed interest in Ji Xiang."

"..."

"Let's not talk about that. I'll fly to your place another day, and we can have a meal together. It's been so long, you're already fifty!"

Director Liu knew the importance of the matter and carefully changed the subject, chatting with his old classmate about the old days.

A few minutes later, after hanging up the phone, Director Liu frowned for a long time before slamming his hand on the table.

"That old Zhao is really disloyal. He could have at least given me a wink when it came to something this big."

……

……

Director Zhao sent an email, then, feeling the effects of the alcohol, went home to sleep.

The next day when he called Professor Sui, his old colleague was attending an academic conference.

Amidst the massive wave of resignations, he had been in Ningbo, a city in the south, for three years, but had not yet adapted to the environment.

Surgery differs between the North and the South; so too does the struggle within the martial arts world differ significantly between the North and the South.

He came to the Second People's Hospital of Ningbo, which is a Class II Grade A hospital, not a high-level one, so he had the opportunity to establish an interventional radiology department.

But no one knows who was behind it. One time, when he went out to attend a conference, the dean led a group directly to his department and announced its cancellation. (Emmm, even writing about this sounds unbelievable, but it's true.)

If it weren't for Professor Sui's kind nature, high level of skill, and good treatment of the doctors and nurses in the department, he would probably have been knocked unconscious and left dazed, never to recover for the rest of his life.

At that time, the doctors and nurses directly resisted the pressure from the hospital and started to cause trouble.

When Director Sui returned home, everything had settled down. His interventional department was not only not canceled, but was established as a separate department.

There are too many twists and turns here, and Director Sui still doesn't understand who is behind this.

So he was very careful, always very careful.

Having finally established himself in Ningbo over the past year, Director Sui cautiously ventured out to attend a training session.

In preparation for adapting to the times, the interventional radiology department of Tiannan Province is holding a provincial surgical competition.

Director Sui was just a junior member there to offer his support; he had never integrated into the academic circle of Tiannan Province, nor did he intend to. He was simply there to show his support and observe high-level surgeries, hoping to learn from their strengths and improve his own.

Today is the last day. Dr. Sui reviewed some surgeries earlier, and his skill level was quite good.

Since it was a surgical recording edited on a machine, the segments where the blood vessel superselection failed were cut off, making it look like everything went quite smoothly.

It mainly comes down to the approach.

On the last day, the grand finale was Ding Yifan, a leading figure in interventional radiology in Tiannan Province, who performed an interventional embolization procedure for liver cancer.

The technique is very ordinary, yet it is not ordinary at all.

If the tumor is located beyond the hepatic artery, and the inpatient department simply inserts a tube to apply iodized oil, it's something that can be done without making a fuss.

Ding Yifan operated on a small 3cm tumor, superselecting the grade 3 artery that supplies the tumor, and the entire surgery was performed very steadily.

"Director Ding's skills are truly exceptional. Look at his SuperSelect strategy, it's so smooth!"

"I usually can't continue the procedure after selecting a grade 2 artery. If I have to select a grade 3 artery, the surgery will take more than 4 hours. Not only can the patient not stand it, but I can't stand it myself either."

"Judging from the recorded surgery, only a segment of about 10 minutes was edited out. I estimate that Professor Ding failed twice. Such delicate blood vessels, and he succeeded in superselection three times—amazing!"

Director Sui listened to the discussions of his fellow soldiers and wholeheartedly agreed with them.

Indeed, superselection of grade 3 vessels is never necessary, but superselection to this location will certainly result in much less damage to the patient.

Some interventional radiology doctors, claiming to be from top-tier hospitals in China, don't even use superselective catheterization. They start injecting large amounts of medication after passing the hepatic artery, completely deceiving patients.

For example, the hospital where Director Ding came from.

The phone rang, and Director Sui answered it.

"Little Sui, it's me, Old Zhao."

"Brother Zhao, what's up?" Director Sui asked in a low voice, holding his phone.

"I performed surgery yesterday... could you take a look?"

"Okay." Director Sui smiled. Director Zhao on the other end of the phone was still the same old Zhao, but he was used to it.

But what exactly was the surgery that made Director Zhao so proud, even calling over to show it off?

"Yesterday's surgery... Let me put it this way, Xiao Sui, my touch is about to improve. I can do a few moves, but I don't understand how to do them. Do you understand what I mean?"

"I understand. There's no theoretical basis, so it won't work every time, and I can't explain the reasoning behind it, but I just managed to do it."

"Congratulations! I'll watch the video and learn from you, Brother Zhao," Director Sui said with a smile.

(End of this chapter)