Chapter 316: Communicate More with the Resident Chief

"Xiao Ji, how did you spot that?"

After returning, Deng Chaohong asked, full of suspicion.

"Teacher Deng, I didn't spot it," Ji Xiang said, spouting nonsense. "I just saw that the color of the patient's feet looked a bit off. As for the Budd-Chiari Syndrome, I just blurted it out because I remembered it being written in a book. Please don't laugh at me."

"Is that so?" Deng Chaohong looked at Ji Xiang earnestly, sizing him up from head to toe, as if seeing him for the first time.

The patient's situation just now was quite special; Budd-Chiari Syndrome rarely presents with symptoms of spinal stenosis in Orthopedics.

In his memory, there was a patient in the Anorectal Department whose hemorrhoids were removed and recurred, removed and recurred, until a full-body examination finally confirmed it was Budd-Chiari Syndrome.

Similar situations are the most headache-inducing; even getting a clear diagnosis is difficult. When a patient's symptoms are atypical, anyone would find it difficult.

If Ji Xiang hadn't been there today, he likely would have misdiagnosed the patient.

Recalling his previous earnest teachings to Ji Xiang, Deng Chaohong's old face flushed a bit more.

"Let's go, let's go eat," Deng Chaohong said.

"Teacher Deng, how many patients do we usually see in the Outpatient Department in a day?" Ji Xiang didn't bring up the Budd-Chiari Syndrome matter, chatting about daily life while tidying up his things.

Deng Chaohong had always been interested in Ji Xiang; he knew deep down that this young man had infinite potential.

After eating and returning to the hospital, they spent the afternoon in the Outpatient Department. When getting off work, Deng Chaohong said to Ji Xiang, "Doctor Xiao Ji, find time to interact more with Resident Chief Xu. The emergency surgeries in our Orthopedics Department are all performed by the Resident Chief. Getting familiar with the Chief Resident and doing more surgeries won't do you any harm."

"Thank you, Teacher Deng."

Ji Xiang also felt he should spend more time in the clinical setting; although he had the System Operating Room, that wasn't everything.

The System Operating Room was more like a training ground; whether one is a mule or a horse, one still has to be taken out to be trained.

He returned to the ward without changing his clothes, instead going to find the Orthopedics Resident Chief, Xu Leyu.

"Chief Xu, do we have many emergency cases in Orthopedics at night?"

Ji Xiang walked to the office door and heard Lu Kai chatting with Resident Chief Xu Leyu.

Lu Kai's communication skills were truly strong; it was the same in the Urology Department, and after coming to the Orthopedics Department, he had once again become as thick as thieves with the Resident Chief in the shortest possible time.

Listening to the familiar and natural tone of his conversation, this little fat man was born with a sense of affinity. Moreover, he was thick-skinned and quick to make friends—traits Ji Xiang did not possess.

Ji Xiang smiled and walked into the office.

"It's alright, not too many, not too few. If you really want to do surgery, you can go back-to-back," Xu Leyu said, glancing at Ji Xiang and answering simply.

Xu Leyu had a fair complexion and an air of scholarly refinement, looking like some popular young actor.

"Whether it's urgent isn't important; the main thing is not to have any incidents," Resident Chief Xu Leyu said to Lu Kai. "You heard what the Director said this morning, right?"

"I heard. I was curious, so I went to ask around today. I reckon the Gastrointestinal Resident Chief was busy preparing for an emergency surgery that day and missed a few words, and the Family Member misunderstood," Lu Kai said.

"Misunderstanding is a small matter," Resident Chief Xu said with a wicked smile, looking at Lu Kai. "Do you know what the most important skill is for being a Resident Chief?"

"Surgery? Diagnosis?" Lu Kai replied.

"No, the most important skill is reading faces."

"!!!" Lu Kai was stunned.

Ji Xiang also found it interesting and sat down to listen carefully to Resident Chief Xu's words.

"Just saying it, I'm afraid you won't understand, so I'll give you an example," Resident Chief Xu said. "A few days ago, there was a complaint in the Gland Department. It sounded very scary; the patient's mother insisted that the surgeon had pricked her son's carotid artery with a needle, almost costing her son his life."

"Uh, that's impossible, right? This kind of thing sounds strange no matter how you hear it..." Lu Kai's voice grew quieter as he spoke.

"It was spread very wildly at the time. I went to take a look, and the Family Member had even taken photos. I took one look, and that wasn't the location of the carotid artery at all; it should have been the scar left after removing the drainage strip following a thyroidectomy."

"Damn, even that can lead to a complaint? And they made it sound so wild? Did the self-media spread it like crazy?" Lu Kai was surprised.

"This kind of thing is clearly the Family Member not understanding and scaring themselves. I don't think they had any other intentions. If they really had intentions, which Medical Record in the hospital couldn't be found to have faults? If we spend all day just writing Medical Records, will we still do surgeries?"

"Chief Xu, you're right," Lu Kai chimed in.

"So, reading faces is very important," Resident Chief Xu said, leaning lazily back in his chair, as if he were about to fall asleep. "Especially when we admit emergency patients. Sometimes there's no choice, but you have to have a sense of whether the patient or the Family Member is troublesome and whether they will make something out of nothing to complain about us."

"Chief Xu, tell us about an example you've encountered," Lu Kai asked with a smile.

Because they weren't familiar, he was still quite polite when speaking to Resident Chief Xu, addressing him as 'you'. In the Urology Department, Lu Kai had long been like a buddy to Wu Zong; the little fat man knew what he was doing.

"There's nothing much to say," Resident Chief Xu smiled. "There are emergencies every day; you'll see when you watch. This matter, the textbooks certainly won't write about it, but it is the most important part of clinical practice."

"The most important?"

"You can be bad at treating illnesses, you can be bad at surgery; after all, there are senior doctors," Resident Chief Xu said. "If there's an issue, ask for instructions and report more. Our Second Affiliated Hospital is different from other hospitals. Senior doctors... for example, the second-line professor on duty today, if I call him in the middle of the night to perform surgery, he won't give me a hard time or look down on me."

"Uh, there's such a thing?! Shouldn't second-line doctors be seeing difficult patients?"

"Of course," Resident Chief Xu said. "Being a doctor is just a profession. Curing illnesses and saving people is the result, not the purpose. Don't get brainwashed before you even start working, immersing yourself in a sense of nobility. Talking about nobility without talking about money is just being a hooligan."

"..."

"..."

Ji Xiang and Lu Kai both didn't know what to say.

"Alright, order food. What do you want to eat?" Resident Chief Xu asked.

"Eat meat!" Lu Kai said without hesitation, grinning.

"How about you, Doctor Xiao Ji?" Resident Chief Xu asked Ji Xiang.

Just as the words fell, an 'ouch' came from the elevator entrance, followed by the faint sound of a delicate voice scolding.

Resident Chief Xu's lips moved, his face looking unhappy.

"My luck has been bad lately; as soon as I mention eating, an emergency comes," Resident Chief Xu said with a sullen face. "Probably an emergency, sigh."

As he spoke, he stood up and tilted his head to look outside the door.

"Doctor, the Emergency Department told us to come up," a young man said with a face full of caution.

"Where are the films? Let me see," Resident Chief Xu saw the patient behind the man, holding her left arm with her right hand, her left shoulder drooping significantly, as if a weight were hanging from it. Knowing it was nothing major, he asked for the films first.

"Here, here," the man immediately handed over the films.

Resident Chief Xu took the films, glanced at the female patient, didn't ask about her condition, and inserted the films into the film viewer.

A left Clavicle Fracture, broken quite severely; even an ordinary person who doesn't know how to read films could tell at a glance.

"How did you get injured?"

"A car accident."

(End of chapter)