Chapter 309: Eat what you need to replenish

Zhang Fan went early to the hospital on Sunday morning to check up on his patients. Normally, surgeries wouldn’t be scheduled on the weekends, as the doctors weren’t working full shifts. The only exceptions would be emergency surgeries and special surgeries which had been scheduled long ago. Xue Fei didn’t come, as he was slacking off. He was truly exhausted due to how much work Zhang Fan’s medical team had been doing. Xue Fei had claimed that he would do nothing apart from changing the medicine, but he would also have to help with a surgery whenever it was busy, and Wang Yanan would definitely still force him into writing medical reports when there were too many for everyone to finish. Zhang Fan didn’t call him, since it was finally the weekend.

“Sir, I’m here to change the medicine for you. You’re recovering quite well. Still, you’re eating a bit too well recently. You’re eating either pork legs or pork feet every day. There’s no need for this,” Zhang Fan told an old man who had a leg fracture surgery recently.

“Sigh! Doctor Zhang, you don’t understand here. As the old saying goes, you should eat what you need to replenish. You’re still too young!” Actually, the old man had just wanted to eat his favorite foods. This was just how people were. Before the surgery, when he’d still been in pain, he had been really obedient no matter what Zhang Fan told him, but now that the surgery was over and he no longer felt pain, he didn’t listen to Zhang Fan at all anymore!

After the patient checkups finished, Zhang Fan told Wang Yanan, “I have something to do today. Could you change the medicine for the patients?”

“Sure, go ahead and do what you need to. You didn’t have to come if you had something to do this morning! Don’t you trust me to take care of things properly here?”

“Of course I trust you, but I truly can’t feel reassured unless I see things for myself. Sigh, that’s how it is in our profession. Alright, that’s it for now, I’m leaving.” Zhang Fan then told the two female rotation doctors, “Thank you for your hard work!”

“It’s nothing at all. Still, you should treat us to a meal,” Jiang Nini answered with a smile. Her smile was really beautiful. Zhang Fan didn’t even dare to look at her.

“Haha!” Zhang Fan only chuckled as he left. He didn’t dare to respond.

“Stingy!” Jiang Nini muttered to herself under her breath.

There were currently many people at Zhang Fan’s hand and foot surgery hospital. They were actually black men, who were quite rare in the border province. Li Liang wasn’t very short, but he seemed both short and weak in comparison to these Africans. Zhang Fan was rendered slightly speechless at the sight.

The black men didn’t seem all that large when watching them play basketball on television, but when they really stood in front of Zhang Fan, they seemed like a black wall. Out of these black men, the tallest and strongest among them was a professional basketball player. Apparently, he had played in the NBA for several years when he was younger. He was a bit older now, so he had come to China to make some money playing in the Chinese Basketball Association instead.

Logically speaking, a professional basketball player who had managed to play in the NBA for several years should have made an excellent income. However, this fellow was extremely poor. According to Wang Yongyong’s friends who were still playing basketball, this black basketball player had already taken out loans on his salary all the way through next season. Even though this black basketball player had no money, he always had several other black men around him who were like his brothers, so he would always keep spending money and borrowing money despite not having money. Saving money was impossible for him.

This fellow also didn’t take good care of his body. He ate and drank whatever he wanted, and also visited prostitutes and gambled. Apparently, the rich owner of the basketball team that signed him started regretting it just three months after the contract was signed. This was because the black basketball player was injured, so he was unable to play basketball. He was sidelined due to the injury.

The injury wasn’t severe. It was rather similar to Yao Ming’s metatarsophalangeal joint injury. Yet, this injury would prevent the black basketball player from playing. The rich team owner felt like he had suffered a severe loss. Giving up on this black basketball player would mean wasting the contracted payment, but not giving up on him would mean spending a tremendous amount on a surgery fee. Just as the rich team owner was hesitating on what to do, he heard from one of Wang Yongyong’s friends about Zhang Fan.

Wang Yongyong’s friend was the drills coach for the rich owner’s team. The coach was mainly in charge of the players’ physical condition. Since he was rather professional, and he liked his job, he started worrying about the owner’s family’s physical condition as well. One time, he happened to mention Zhang Fan to the owner while the latter was exercising. The rich owner paid attention and remembered Zhang Fan’s name. Why was this? It was because Zhang Fan’s surgery fee was cheap, yet the surgery was really effective. It was highly difficult to find a professional sports medicine doctor in China.

The basketball team owner was really rich, but he was the first generation of his family to have been rich. He had started from nothing and worked really hard. He had purchased a basketball team for the sake of more profits and his name brand, but his money wouldn’t grow on trees. He was unwilling to spend big money on a nationally acclaimed surgeon for the sake of an average basketball player. Hence, he sent people to learn more about Zhang Fan’s hospital, which ended with these black men all traveling to Chasu City.

When Zhang Fan arrived at his hospital, he saw that several old men and women who had gotten up early in the morning to exercise or buy groceries were standing around. Chasu City was a small city. Even though Chasu City was on the border, and foreigners were relatively common, black men were rare, especially black men who wore such strange clothing. Thus, everyone gathered around to gawk.

These black men were all tall and strong. Moreover, they were wearing really colorful clothing and really exaggeratedly large gold chains. They also had earrings as well as nose rings and lip rings. The shiny rings hanging from their thick lips made it seem like two sausages had been linked together.

Wang Yongyong counted as the middleman here. He had come as well. He saw Zhang Fan from far away and happily came over to give Zhang Fan a hug. Wang Yongyong was now doing much better than before. Not only had his knee pain been cured by Zhang Fan’s surgery, he was now in good enough physical condition to work as a private fitness coach after work, which improved his income. He now seemed a lot more energetic than before.

“Haha, Doctor Zhang, long time no see! I missed you so much!” Wang Yongyong hugged Zhang Fan in delight.

“Coach Wang, haha, how are you? How’s your knee joint doing?”

“It’s great! I can even crouch deeply now!” Wang Yongyong exaggeratedly patted his knee.

The two of them chatted a little before Wang Yongyong brought Zhang Fan in front of the group of black men. A short woman was standing next to the black men. She seemed just like a child when standing next to them. Wang Yongyong brought Zhang Fan over to her and did the introductions. “This is Mrs. Wang. She’s the manager. Mrs. Wang, this is Doctor Zhang, who will be the primary surgeon.”

“Hello, Doctor Zhang.” Mrs. Wang had large black-rimmed eyeglasses and light makeup. She was wearing a professional suit and was quite polite.

“Hello, Manager Wang.” Zhang Fan smiled while shaking hands with her. Mrs. Wang then introduced the black basketball player to Zhang Fan. The black basketball player was quite friendly and shook hands with him. Zhang Fan was really astonished because the black basketball player’s hand was really large. Zhang Fan figured that the black basketball player’s hand was at least 33% larger than his own.

Mrs. Wang was the manager as well as the translator. The black men wouldn’t understand a single word of Chinese without her translating for them. Thus, she directly began to discuss business with Zhang Fan, Batu, and Chen Qifa. “Doctor Zhang, can you estimate if he’ll be able to play basketball again after the surgery? If he can still play, how long will he need for recovery?” She had long since checked the surgery fee already. Batu had originally wanted to haggle for the surgery fee, but she immediately brought out Zhang Fan’s hospital’s price chart. It was normal for people like her to be successful.

“That’s difficult to say. Complete checkups must be done first. The specifics will also have to be determined after the surgery. It will depend on the patient’s recovery after the surgery. I truly don’t have any guarantee on when he will be able to start exercising or participate in vigorous activities.” Zhang Fan simply told the truth as it was.

“Is there any possibility that he’ll never be able to play professional basketball again after the surgery?” Mrs. Wang inquired.

“That’s difficult to say.”

“According to your professional analysis, please at least estimate the possibility of this happening. If he really can’t play professional basketball in the future, we definitely won’t blame you for that. Is that alright?” Mrs. Wang needed to report to her higher-ups, so she had to ask Zhang Fan for an estimate of this possibility. Business was business. What they focused on was different from what Zhang Fan focused on.

“Okay! Let’s do this. First, we’ll do all the necessary checkups. After that, I can give you a preliminary estimate.”

“We’ve already finished all the necessary checkups. Here’s the MRIs, and here’s the CT scans.” Mrs. Wang then brought out many checkups’ results.

Zhang Fan didn’t mind. He took the scans and started investigating them together with Chen Qifa and Li Liang. Batu accompanied Mrs. Wang and the black men as they chatted.

“Surgery will be alright! But with his weight, it will likely take him half a year to fully recover,” Zhang Fan estimated after he finished checking the scans and the black basketball player’s condition.

“Okay, we’ll be troubling you then. Let’s start the hospitalization procedures right away.” Mrs. Wang was really happy to hear this. An expert doctor in Raptor City had told her that the black basketball player wouldn’t be able to play professional basketball again after the surgery. She had brought him over here as a last resort. Although Zhang Fan was really young, he was already becoming rather famous in the area.

Mrs. Wang then spoke some words to the black basketball player. Zhang Fan had worked hard at studying English, so he was able to understand some of what she said. Basically, she said something like “This doctor is amazing, and he can help to treat you.” However, Zhang Fan had more difficulty understanding the black basketball player’s response. The black basketball player said something like looking down on Zhang Fan’s hospital for being too small!

Zhang Fan frustratedly thought to himself, ‘Foreigners have dialects just like us Chinese, and also have the same problem of judging by appearance!’

The black basketball player was far too large. Zhang Fan’s hospital’s beds were way too small for him. He was unable to stretch himself flat on the bed. What could be done about this? Batu began to negotiate with Mrs. Wang. “Just look, we’ll have to modify our patient rooms just for him. Not only is the bed not a good fit, we’ll also have to modify many things in the operating room…”

“Haha, we can pay extra to purchase a new bed for his patient room. I think that needing to modify things in the operating room is an exaggeration. I’ve already learned about this subject. At most, you’ll only need to add an extra-large chair. Isn’t that right, Director Batu?” Mrs. Wang asked with a smile.

The two were equals at negotiation! Zhang Fan didn’t need to worry about any of this. He only needed to worry about the surgery. “Li Liang, Song Bing, come over here. Let’s discuss the surgery together.”