Chapter 268: Depressing department
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu

The warm sun of spring was slowly increasing the temperature of the world. All sorts of construction projects started up again. The originally quiet Chasu City Hospital became really noisy due to construction of its new emergency center and pediatrics center, which also really annoyed the patients.

In any hospital, pain would forever be the main topic. Only the obstetrics department would be relatively happier, with the more muscular doctors here having more chances at being happy than in other departments. That was because the obstetrics department would see the birth of human future and hope. Apart from the obstetrics department, the majority of departments would always have a heavy atmosphere.

In the morning, Zhang Fan brought his rotation paperwork over to the rheumatology department. “Doctor Zhang, welcome! Have a seat! I heard that you’re originally from orthopedic surgery?” Director Wu Wanghong spoke in a really polite way to Zhang Fan.

“When I was recruited to the hospital, I was recruited as an orthopedic surgeon.” Zhang Fan felt rather awkward. He was still only a mere resident doctor. It wasn’t like he was originally from any department yet! Still, this was also evidence that Zhang Fan was becoming famous in Chasu City Hospital. Even Director Wu, who paid very little attention to gossip, knew about Zhang Fan and was treating him as an equal.

“Oh, then we’re sister professions. During your rotation here, try and familiarize yourself with our department. We’ll have many opportunities to work together in the future. Doctor Zhang, take three days to get used to things here, and then you can independently be in charge of your own patients. How about it?”

“Alright, Director,” Zhang Fan agreed.

What had Director Wu meant when he said that rheumatology and orthopedic surgery were sister professions? This was actually quite a heavy topic.

The majority of rheumatic diseases would cause all sorts of damage to the limbs and joints. Once internal medicine was no longer able to use medicine to prevent the spread of rheumatic disease, only surgery would be available in order to improve the patient’s condition.

Patients would still have hope when receiving surgery for a traumatic injury. As long as the patient was careful, they would recover after the surgery. It would simply be like a small trial in life since the traumatic injury wasn’t an illness that would repeat itself. However, that wouldn’t be the same for rheumatic diseases. Even a surgery wouldn’t solve the problem! To give an analogy, surgery for a rheumatic disease was merely the equivalent of pouring a cup of cold water into a pot of boiling water.

“For the first three days, just follow Doctor Hu Jun and familiarize yourself with our department’s work and personnel. Let’s go now, it’s time for the daily morning meeting.”

Thus began Zhang Fan’s work in the rheumatology department. When looking at medical reports in this department, they really would seem quite grand. The medical reports contained all sorts of numbers, English words—even though the report was written in Chinese, all sorts of factors, and so on. However, after looking through dozens of medical reports, Zhang Fan found that all the results were quite similar. No matter how detailed the medical report or how wonderful the analysis of the patient’s condition, almost all of the treatments were the same: non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs to treat pain, hormones for anti-inflammation, and immunosuppressive medication! Patients who were in more severe condition would also have an orthopedic surgeon invited for diagnosis!

“This is Doctor Zhang. I believe that everyone should be familiar with him already. He’s a surgeon. I won’t be introducing everyone to him, as you can all slowly get acquainted with each other during work! Let’s go to work,” Director Wu said simply as he left to perform outpatient services.

“Doctor Zhang, let’s go check on the patients together.” Hu Jun and Zhang Fan began checking up on the patients. “My patient #3 has ankylosing spondylitis, while patient #8 has rheumatoid arthritis,” Hu Jun told Zhang Fan.

After the patient checkups were over, next would be giving medical advice for the day, modifying medical reports, dealing with laboratory examination paperwork, discharge paperwork, hospitalization paperwork, and so on. This was the daily work in an internal medicine department. Zhang Fan finished his first day in the rheumatology department, encountering nothing but the patients’ moans of pain and the family members’ expressions of sadness.

Zhang Fan felt rather awkward in this department. How could he describe it? In surgical departments, even though the patient was sometimes in grave danger, at least the patient’s family members still usually had a sliver of hope that as long as the surgery was successful, the patient could recover. The other internal medicine departments were also different from the rheumatology department. Even if other departments weren’t able to cure a patient of their problem, at least they would be able to improve the patient’s quality of life.

Even in the oncology department, although the air was also filled with sadness there, that type of sadness was one where people could vent.

As for the rheumatology department? It seemed mostly like the atmosphere was filled with smog. It was as if the patients could only forever bear with the depressing pain. The patients’ family members also had blank expressions of not knowing what the future would hold. This was basically torture, constant pain and torture!

Three days went by in a flash. Zhang Fan began to independently take patients for rheumatology. As always, he was grinding as much as he possibly could in these three days. Every time that he entered a new department, if it was in a category that his System had yet to open up to him, Zhang Fan would definitely work his hardest to learn every single disease in the department.

A tremendous amount of work would be required to learn all the diseases in any department. He would have to start from histology and embryology! This was how difficult the medical field was. In order to truly understand things, one would have to start from the cells or the binding of sperm and egg!

When it came to basics, surgery was more difficult than internal medicine! This was a definite. It was useless even if you studied every medical textbook out there. At most, you would only be a scholar. The foundations were really important in surgery, but clinical experience was even more important. A surgeon would need a large number of patients to practice on in order to improve. If you didn’t work at a good hospital that could provide a platform for you, then a surgeon would be nothing more than an appendicitis surgeon despite working in surgery for their whole life!

Zhang Fan had chosen surgery because he could practice surgeries endlessly in his System. His System didn’t really require much from him apart that he perform a tremendously high number of surgeries in real life in order to grind experience. That was because there would be no end to ever grinding surgical experience. There would be a tremendous difference between a surgeon with 1,000 surgeries’ worth of experience and a surgeon with only 100 surgeries’ worth of experience.

That was why Zhang Fan never had any free time at all. He used every single bit of free time he had to endlessly practice surgeries in his System. Was this boring? It was really boring and repetitive. However, Zhang Fan didn’t find it boring at all. The fact that he loved surgery was his greatest motivator!

“Zhang Fan, could you please stop daydreaming? I’m talking to you! With how you are, I’m beginning to worry if you’re getting Alzheimer’s!” Shao Hua was getting rather angry. The two of them finally had some free time to be with each other, but as she talked to him, Zhang Fan started going off into a daze.

“Oh! Oh! I’m listening, so please go on!” Zhang Fan hurriedly replied. Shao Hua was chatting about gossip related to her bank job. Zhang Fan was really bored while listening to this, but he knew that it would be rude to interrupt her, so he took advantage of this time to enter his System and mentally practice more surgeries. However, this made Shao Hua really displeased with him.

“I’m not going to say any more!” For once, Shao Hua was angry with him. She twisted her head and ignored Zhang Fan.

“Haha, you’re angry? Still, I feel like you’re quite beautiful when you’re angry. There’s this special aura about you.” Zhang Fan hurriedly pulled Shao Hua’s hand and began to smile while trying to make her happy.

“What type of special aura?” Shao Hua turned around. Although she was still frowning, her mouth was already beginning to curve upward.

“Yeah, just like a~”

“Annoying! Others will see us.”

Zhang Fan was unable to make anything else up, so he simply grabbed Shao Hua and kissed her. Shao Hua’s face reddened as she gently pushed Zhang Fan.

After sharing a warm embrace, Shao Hua leaned against his chest and played with his fingers. “Your fingers are so long. I feel like even my fingers aren’t as pretty as yours.”

When Shao Hua said this, Zhang Fan took a close look at his hands. Only then did he discover that his fingers had actually undergone modification by his System. His fingers were really long, and there was an obvious bulge on his fingertips. Having bulging fingertips would increase the hand’s sensitivity. These were hands that any surgeon would want to have!

“Oh, by the way, you’re currently in the rheumatology department, is that right?” Shao Hua looked up at Zhang Fan.

“Yeah, what about it?”

“I have a female coworker who asked me this morning to help her out. She said that she wants to get treated at Chasu City Hospital, and asked if I could introduce an expert doctor to her.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Oh, it seems that she has something really troublesome. She said that she needed a rheumatology expert.”

“Sure, no problem. Bring her tomorrow morning to find me.” Zhang Fan then slowly touched a certain rather soft location with his hand, but Shao Hua slapped his hand away!

Zhang Fan was really able to rest assured about his private hospital now. Batu hadn’t been a superintendent for 10 years for nothing. He was really familiar with all of the necessary government leaders to contact who would help keep the hospital running smoothly. He also knew whom to give gifts to, and what type of gifts to give!

Batu was even more skilled at hospital management. He skillfully took care of everything within the hospital. Not only that, Batu was also really skilled at expanding Zhang Fan’s hospital’s presence in the market.

He contacted medical equipment merchants, medicine sales representatives, insurance companies, taxi companies, and so on. Anyone who sent a patient to Zhang Fan’s hospital for orthopedic traumatic injury or limb replantation surgery would be paid 100 yuan as thanks, no matter if the patient chose to get treated at Zhang Fan’s hospital or not. Batu also had Zhang Fan’s hospital’s sales managers increase their communication with the local city hospitals’ doctors from the emergency department and orthopedic surgery department.

Batu split the doctors into three medical teams. The three teams would be compared to one another in overall income, number of surgeries, and the patients’ reviews, giving each team an overall score. The team ranking first each month would be awarded a bonus amount of money! There were plenty of patients, so the doctors’ income was quite nice. Everyone in the hospital was really motivated! As long as Zhang Fan had the time, he always had surgeries he could perform here! His surgery experience in his System was going up at a visible rate!

On the next day, Zhang Fan received a phone call from Shao Hua after he finished dealing with his own patients. “Zhang Fan, I’m here with my coworker.”

“Just come directly to the rheumatology department! Our director just happens to be here today.” Zhang Fan hung up the call. Not long after, Shao Hua arrived with her coworker.

Zhang Fan immediately sighed in his mind the moment that he saw Shao Hua’s coworker. ‘What a pity!’ thought Zhang Fan to himself.