He had performed the same procedure numerous times in the first general surgery department. After all, the most a junior doctor could do during surgery was assist the chief surgeon by disinfecting the surgical site or pulling the retractor.
How much one could learn from it depended solely on their own understanding.
That was why he particularly admired Zheng Ren, a man who could soar into the sky once an opportunity was presented, which was a rarity in today's world.
As for Su Yun… Yang Lei had heard through the gr.a.p.evine that he was skilled at surgery, but for some unknown reason, had gone to work in the ICU instead of the general surgery department when he had first arrived in Sea City General Hospital.
After Yang Lei applied the last surgical dr.a.p.e on the surgical site, Su Yun immediately stood at the chief surgeon's position and began disinfecting the site one last time.
Yang Lei was unconcerned about what his current role was. After all, this was merely an appendectomy, a surgery that he had done numerous times and was fed up with.
Even so, he still acted cautiously and meticulously as it was his first surgery with Su Yun.
Since Zheng Ren had let them work together, he had to check every detail and make sure the surgery was uneventful.
Soon, he began to appreciate Su Yun's surgical skill.
The skin was incised up to the capillary network above the subcutaneous layer in one go, no further. That was amazing!
Nothing more, nothing less. The end result was just perfect.
He then bluntly dissected the tissue without using electrocauterization for hemostasis.
Damn, this guy was good!
Yang Lei could admit that he had limited talent, but instead of being consumed with jealousy, he would only feel envious of those born with great talent.
Blunt dissection was complete, the peritoneal cavity exposed… Yang Lei soon found out that he had to be very alert to perfectly perform his tasks as a first surgical assistant.
Su Yun's maneuvering was simply too fast and accurate, and he could not afford to be distracted for even a split second.
After the peritoneum was well-shielded and the appendix fully exposed, the appendicular artery was then separated, clamped and transected. Everything was done according to procedure in surgery textbooks.
The inflamed appendix was removed and thrown into a specimen container.
Before the surgery had begun, Yang Lei, a general surgeon, had nursed some grievances about Su Yun's role as a chief surgeon.
However, it had been revealed that Su Yun was indeed very good at performing surgery.
Yang Lei was dazed and confused. Were savants really that powerful, capable of steamrolling every opponent with ease?
Following peritoneal cavity irrigation with warm normal saline, Yang Lei immediately aspirated the contents using an aspirator with a suction tube.
Su Yun began closing the peritoneal cavity after ensuring the absence of active bleeding spots.
"That was fast. There isn't any active bleeding, right?" A voice came from behind Su Yun.
Yang Lei raised his head and saw Zheng Ren.
"Yes. There aren't any, I've checked. Blood loss is minimal… with a visual estimation of 3mL," answered Yang Lei.
"Good," Zheng Ren praised.
"Your anesthesiologist is rather slow." Yang Lei chatted leisurely with Zheng Ren as he pulled the retractor for better exposure of the surgical field.
That was how it was in the operating theater. Major accidents could happen if none of them uttered a single word.
"Huh? Chu Yanran was quick at administering anesthesia, and I've already completed my surgery."
Already…
Completed…
Yang Lei was unsure if he was having an illusion, but Su Yun looked stunned for a very brief moment.
Chapter 136 - Scientific Research In Imperial Capital
"You guys go ahead with abdominal wound closure. I'll head downstairs with the patient first." Relaxed, Zheng Ren left the operating theater after ensuring that their surgery was uneventful as well.
The moment he stepped out of the operating theater, he suddenly realized something and decided to take his time by chatting with the patient instead. The conversation continued until Su Yun and Yang Lei's surgery was complete before the patients were wheeled out together.
Both families were pleased to see the patients transferred out simultaneously without any problems. What else could they complain about when it had ended perfectly?
Zheng Ren noticed that Su Yun seemed downhearted upon their return to the ward, but could not be bothered to push the matter. Who knew what happened to the acerbic man?
…
…
The weather became colder each day. When the last leaf had fallen, it signified the official arrival of harsh winter.
Admission, resuscitation, surgery and hospital discharge… Everything remained the same as the days went by.
Zheng Yunxia was discharged from the hospital, but her disease was not entirely cured.
She would have to return for a consultation in thirty-five days, and would most likely require another interventional radiological treatment for her condition.
Fortunately, the patient with tetanus did not have respiratory arrest due to timely treatment, recovering after ten days and being discharged from the hospital.
The family was very thankful during discharge.
Poverty restricted their ability to show appreciation with financial rewards, so they purchased a pack of candy for Zheng Ren before leaving the hospital.
Zheng Ren ate one, savoring its sweetness, before putting the precious gift into the cabinet.
Normal days were like a tranquil sea, peaceful but dull, and every rescue operation disturbed this calm like a storm sending monstrous waves crashing in all directions. Zheng Ren, like a boat rising and falling amongst the mountains of angry waves, would use his knowledge and proficiency in surgery to turn the tide and regain peace every single time.
Su Yun gradually began to believe that Zheng Ren's surgery skills were superior to his. Perplexed, he started reading the Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery book that Zheng Ren had been reading as if trying to find answers.
Half a month had passed, and the continuous side mission One Tree Does Not Make A Forest had long been completed. Zheng Ren, who had obtained the Master rank in the 3D image reconstruction of CT scan skill, had also gone to the CT room to get acquainted with the staff and assist them during his free time while trying to find possibilities to apply this technology to emergency treatment and surgery.
However, Zheng Ren had been disappointed to find that the System was as slippery as an eel.
This skill had nothing to do with the emergency department at all.
Come to think of it, all emergency cases required speedy treatment, but 3D image reconstruction of CT scans required a full day on average.
Contratians could always bring up exceptions, but the probability of them happening was less than one-thousandth or even one-ten-thousandth; completely insignificant.
Regardless, Zheng Ren did pay it much mind. Nobody could predict the future, and he could not perform emergency surgery for the rest of his life, either. There were so many elective surgery cases out there, why would he abandon them all for emergency cases?
'The skill will be useful someday.' Zheng Ren comforted himself.
After half a month of hard work, he had acc.u.mulated 3223 points in his general surgery skill tree and saved up 1939 skill points in his inventory. He had earned dozens of skill points in interventional radiology as well, but at Master rank, it was getting increasingly difficult to obtain more points through simple surgeries alone.
Thus, he was glad that he had not rashly upgraded his general surgery skill to Master rank.
Even when he flawlessly completed a tier-three surgery, he could only obtain a few points in his Master rank interventional radiology skill tree. However, the same surgery awarde
d more than ten points to his Expert rank general surgery skill tree.
The difference was humongous.
Therefore, Zheng Ren resisted the temptation to do it the easy way and prepared to lay a solid foundation for his general surgery skill.
In his inventory lay two skill books that could raise a random skill to the peak of the Graduate rank. He had also acc.u.mulated 231260 experience points, which could be converted to approximately 64 hours of surgery intensive training time.
Zheng Ren was greatly satisfied as he now possessed the ability to cope with any trouble that came his way.
He turned a blind eye to the three silver c.h.e.s.ts that he had thrown into the System.
The troublemakers and cheaters had taken turns to hold the silk banner high in the air outside the emergency building for three days without even resting at night. It had been an agonizing experience for them.
In the end, the incident had attracted lots of attention and became a unique scene in Sea City General Hospital.
Following the group's quiet disappearance three days later, Little Six informed Zheng Ren that the troublemakers had gone to visit another hospital.
Zheng Ren, naturally, did not have the heart of Saint Mary. He did not care if the professional troublemakers, who had nearly cost him his future, lived a healthy and prosperous life.
One day, when it was already past four o'clock and almost time to get off work, Old Chief Physician Pan suddenly called Zheng Ren to his office.
Old Chief Physician Pan looked serious when Zheng Ren entered the office, but the joy underneath his solemn expression was clearly detectable.
"Sit, Little Zheng," Old Chief Physician Pan said, cutting straight to the point, "I just received a call from Professor Pei, saying that new scientific research in Imperial Capital requires the participation of young, talented interventional radiologists."
"Imperial Capital? Scientific research?" Zheng Ren had his doubt.
"He didn't go into detail, and I'm not in the right position to ask for more information. Perhaps a new surgical technique has reached its final phase and can be applied clinically." Old Chief Physician Pan smiled and said, "People who can devote their lives to research are really rare nowadays."
"I'm a chief resident. The emergency wards—" Before Zheng Ren could finish the sentence, Old Chief Physician Pan interrupted him: "Will the Earth stop spinning in your absence? Once you're gone, I'll make a request to promote either Su Yun or Yang Lei to chief resident."
Zheng Ren thought about it and knew it made sense.
Any hospital that depended only on one individual would surely meet its doom in the end.
"When will I go?" asked Zheng Ren.
"He said it's up to you, you can go whenever you feel like it. You also know scientific research can't be finished in one night, so don't worry too much about it. Besides, a lot of experts will be present, so there is nothing you could possibly do over there, but don't forget to expand your social network. They can help you greatly in the future," replied Old Chief Physician Pan.
"Okay," Zheng Ren said, "I'll depart in a few days. There's no rush, anyway."
"Alright." Old Chief Physician Pan nodded in response. In his opinion, the best moment was the next time when Professor Pei called him to urge Zheng Ren for a speedy departure.
However, to him, Zheng Ren's participation would serve no purpose in Imperial Capital and he merely considered it a vacation awarded to Zheng Ren for his recent diligence and hard work.
They continued chatting for a while. Then, a phone call interrupted them as Zheng Ren reported a few difficult surgeries that he had performed in the past few days.
"Chief Zheng, there is an emergency case of hemorrhagic shock," said the caller briefly before immediately hanging up.
"Let's check it out." Old Chief Physician Pan immediately stood and walked out of the room.
The emergency resuscitation room was in chaos. The nurses were measuring blood pressures and attempting venous cannulations, and a doctor was examining the patient while instructing a nurse to administer drugs from time to time.
However, the patient was obviously suffering severe hemorrhagic shock as there was no flashback of blood after several attempts at cannulation.
"Allow me." Zheng Ren quickly walked forward, opened a sterile pack of central venous catheterization equipment and began the procedure.
"Chief Physician Pan, Chief Zheng, the patient was sent here via ambulance four minutes ago. Systolic pressure at that time was 50mmHg and diastolic pressure was undetectable. He has a thready and rapid pulse of 163 beats per minute," the doctor on duty quickly rattled off. "Physical examination revealed that the patient has board-like rigidity of the abdomen, so a visceral rupture is suspected."
The doctor in charge of ultrasonography hurried over with a B-scan ultrasonography machine.
A diagnosis flickered across the System panel floating on the upper right corner of Zheng Ren's vision—ruptured hepatic aneurysm complicated with hemorrhagic shock.
An aneurysm was a common… Not really a disease, but an abnormal dilatation of an artery due to a weakened vessel wall.
Since the capillary network was dense, any rupture would lead to a huge amount of blood loss.
No one knew what had caused the aneurysm in this patient to rupture in the first place and result in massive hemorrhaging.
The central venous line was established on the first attempt with the flashback of a small amount of deoxygenated blood.
"Replace his lost fluids, collect blood samples and prepare for surgery!"
Chapter 137 - You Never Know Which Comes First, Tomorrow Or Accident
The main purpose of blood collection was to determine the patient's blood type for transfusion.
Transfusion was best for treating hemorrhagic shock.
"A large amount of fluid can be seen in the hepatic fossa with minimal fluid acc.u.mulation in the Morison's pouch. Suspected cause is hepatic rupture leading to intr.a.p.eritoneal hemorrhage," a doctor reported their ultrasonographic findings.
"What surgery are you going to do?" asked Old Chief Physician Pan.
"Interventional radiology for hemostasis," Zheng Ren replied, "Notify the operating theater to prepare corresponding equipment."
Having already connected the intravenous infusion drip, the nurse threw a pack of dextran and an ECG monitor onto the stretcher trolley, which Zheng Ren quickly escorted to the operating theater.
"Chief Physician Pan, I'll leave preoperative counseling to you." Zheng Ren disappeared around the corner in a flash.
Old Chief Physician Pan was grim, fully aware of the patient's critical condition.
An undetectable diastolic pressure meant decreased intravascular volume due to rapid blood loss. Mortality risk remained high even with surgical intervention.
Zheng Ren rushed to the emergency operating theater to perform the surgery. In the meantime, Old Chief Physician Pan began to direct medical staff to preserve and mark the patient's clothes under video surveillance as evidence.
This was not done out of sympathy.
Countless unidentified patients were admitted to the hospital each year. After they were successfully rescued, they found out… No one knew if this was the truth, but they claimed to have lost their belongings and demanded compensation from medical personnel. It was a common trend in the current world.
Therefore, emergency rescue was often delayed by these trivial matters, and whether anyone had lost their life because of this, nobody knew.
Fortunately, this patient was in a critical state and required immediate surgical intervention, and Old Chief Physician Pan, who had not gotten off work, could help Zheng Ren deal with this issue. If this incident had happened in the middle of the night, legal procedures like preoperative counseling alone would take too much time and likely cost the patient his life.
Sometimes, apart from a doctors' expertise, fate was another important factor in a patient's survival.
A c
ell phone, fully accessible without a password lock as the patient was an elderly man, was found among his belongings.
Old Chief Physician Pan searched through its call history and tapped on a number labelled 'Darling'.
"This is the Sea City General Hospital emergency department.
"Are you Tang Guoqing's family member? Please come to Sea City General Hospital emergency department immediately. Your father has severe intra-abdominal bleeding and requires urgent surgical treatment.
"The patient has gone to the operating theater, but there are some procedures that need to be done.
"His condition is very serious, so I can't guarantee the success of surgical treatment."
Old Chief Physician Pan calmly and objectively explained the situation to the family member before putting the phone into a clean yellow biohazard bag, which was then sealed by a nurse.
Even though the family member had been informed about the situation, the patient still had to undergo surgery without waiting for his family to sign the preoperative informed consent doc.u.ments.
Soon, a staff member of the medical administration division arrived at the emergency department. Old Chief Physician Pan urged him to begin recording the situation and confirm that the emergency surgery was greenlighted.
Old Chief Physician Pan speculated that the emergency surgery had already begun, which was considered a minor violation of rules, but such things were negligible when a life was at stake.
Approximately ten minutes later, a woman in her late twenties with a pair of rimless spectacles hurried into the emergency department.
She was barefoot. Perhaps she had discarded her high heels somewhere along the way for impeding her speed.
"Nurse, I'm Tang Guoqing's daughter. Where is my father? How is he? What happened to him?" asked the woman anxiously.
Tears had tracked down her chalk-white face and ruined her beautiful makeup, but she cared nothing for it and bombarded a nurse with questions.
Her voice was loud, impatient and impolite.
The nurse, who had been working in the emergency department for a long time, empathized with family members and patiently replied without any resentment, "The chief is in the office. Please speak with him."
The Surgeon's Studio c1-799 Page 72