Chapter 19: I’m sorry, I tried my very best
Translator: imperfectluck Editor: Kurisu
The weather was now becoming even colder. The streets became more festive as it was almost New Year’s. The warm heat in the hospital was making people restless.
After Gao Shijun left, Yang Chengming no longer behaved so arrogantly. He had finally matured due to seeing reality. Yang Chengming and Li Liang were now also occasionally allowed to be on duty by themselves. However, even though they were also allowed to see patients, the patients were still all recorded under Chen Qifa. Old Chen took all the commission without sharing any with the two intern doctors.
However, Chen Qifa did share half of the commission taken from the two intern doctors with Zhang Fan. Chen Qifa absolutely insisted even though Zhang Fan tried to refuse out of politeness. This was just how Kuake City Hospital’s work environment was. And actually, Zhang Fan wasn’t really trying to resist against it. Of course he would be delighted to have more money.
Today, there was a festive atmosphere in the rented house that Zhang Fan lived in together with the four female intern doctors. This was because today was Wang Sha’s birthday. She had ignored Li Hui for a considerable amount of time before finally forgiving him temporarily after Li Hui agreed to many unfair conditions.
The rented house also came with a kitchen. Li Hui intended to host a birthday party for Wang Sha at the house as a way of making her happier. He had invited Zhang Fan to this birthday party long ago. Zhang Fan immediately rushed over to the house after he finished giving Kang Hua a massage.
Of course, Zhang Fan couldn’t allow himself to attend a birthday party emptyhanded. Since he now had some more money, he purchased a bottle of red wine as a birthday gift for Wang Sha. When Zhang Fan entered the house, he saw that apart from Chen Lulu, who was still working a shift at the hospital, everyone else was already helping out in the kitchen. Right when he returned to the house, Chen Lulu came in right after.
“You two arrived simultaneously. Were the two of you doing something together?” Li Hui commented as he stepped out of the kitchen. Zhang Fan didn’t even get a chance to explain that it was only a coincidence when Chen Lulu, who was taking off her shoes, spoke first. “We were out on a date. Is that something we must report to you? Zhang Fan, help hold my purse for me. It’s not convenient to hold it while I’m taking off my shoes.” Everyone else, Zhang Fan included, was rather surprised by this.
Normally speaking, Chen Lulu had an alright relationship with everyone else. However, she had a prideful aura about her. Not only did she act ambiguously with Zhang Fan, she rarely spoke more than a few words. Everyone felt that she was looking down on them.
This was because Chen Lulu was from a relatively rich family. She also had a relative who was a high-ranked government official. She had also been able to immediately start working at the administrative office right after joining Kuake City Hospital due to her connections. Perhaps all of this made her feel like she had the right to be proud.
“What’s going on?” Li Hui was astonished.
“Hey, hurry and fry the vegetables. Everyone is here now.” Wang Sha nudged Li Hui as she whispered to him, “It doesn’t have anything to do with you.”
Actually, Chen Lulu had noticed Zhang Fan parking his borrowed car. At the time, Chen Lulu had wanted to call out to him, but ended up restraining herself. ‘Is he a rich second generation? Not to mention, a rich second generation with a weird personality!’ This was what she thought of Zhang Fan after seeing him drive such a high-class car.
Her uncle also owned a Toyota Cruiser Prado, which was why she knew this car was very expensive. Yet, Zhang Fan typically dressed no different from a farmer. For a rich second generation like him to come all the way to a tiny city hospital in a border province to be a doctor meant either that he was crazy or that he had a weird personality! But now that she saw Zhang Fan’s car and assumed that he was a rich second generation, Chen Lulu was no longer averse to starting some type of relationship with him.
Li Hui was quite skilled at making his previously angry girlfriend happy with him again. He was pretty good at cooking a variety of dishes that all tasted great. He sang Wang Sha the “Happy Birthday” song as she blew out the candles on a cake. Everyone here had all recently graduated from medical college, and there was a nice atmosphere at the party. Li Hui had even obtained a CD player from somewhere to play some music in the house. He had spent a great deal of effort on this party.
While everyone was making a commotion, telling Zhang Fan that he needed to sing some karaoke, his cell phone rang. “It’s from Superintendent Batu,” mouthed Zhang Fan. Li Hui immediately turned off the karaoke on the TV.
“Hurry over to the emergency department. There’s a patient who’s in urgent condition, hurry!” Batu immediately hung up the phone.
This was just how the job of doctor was. You might get called in to work at any moment, even if it was your day off. Zhang Fan didn’t waste any time as he immediately put on his jacket and left. Seeing how hurriedly Zhang Fan had left, nobody else felt like singing anymore.
“I wonder what could have happened?” Li Hui muttered to himself. He had never been summoned back to the hospital before for any type of emergency when he was off duty.
“Just who could Zhang Fan be? The superintendent seems to really value him.” Chen Lulu was now incredibly curious about Zhang Fan.
Li Hui sighed as he explained, “All of us in the first group of recent graduates came from S Province. We were all college students with no connections to speak of. In the past few months since our arrival, Zhang Fan’s already made a name for himself. That’s because he’s amazingly skilled. He’s basically the person in charge of the orthopedic surgery department now.
“A while back, Superintendent Batu’s nephew almost lost his life in a serious accident. Zhang Fan performed the surgery that saved the superintendent’s nephew’s life. Not only that, Zhang Fan is humble and never shows off. He’s really quite something.” Li Hui could only sigh in amazement as they had all arrived together, yet Zhang Fan was now so far ahead of him in the hospital.
‘Really now!’ Chen Lulu wondered to herself about what Zhang Fan was like. She was now completely curious about him.
Meanwhile, Zhang Fan immediately ran to the emergency department after parking his car. He saw many police officers present. Although there were many people, it was incredibly quiet, and the atmosphere seemed depressed.
“Zhang Fan, hurry and check the CT scan. A criminal ran over one of Kuake City’s police officers with a car.” Batu was currently standing at the entrance of the patient’s room together with some important-looking people. The director of internal medicine and Vice Director Shi Lei of brain surgery were already inside, working to stabilize the patient’s condition.
“How is it?” Batu asked since Zhang Fan didn’t say anything for quite a while as he looked at the CT scan.
“Let me see the patient first,” Zhang Fan replied while hurriedly putting on a white doctor’s coat before entering the patient’s room.
“His heartbeat has returned. When he first arrived here, he didn’t even have a heartbeat anymore. However, his heartbeat still isn’t stable. It might stop at any time. He’s in severe shock due to too much blood loss,” the director of internal medicine told Zhang Fan.
Zhang Fan swiftly inspected the patient’s condition before looking over at Shi Lei. Shi Lei gently shook his head. Zhang Fan gritted his teeth before leaving the patient’s room.
“The patient has a severe comminuted fracture of the pelvis along with massive bleeding. Even now, the bleeding still hasn’t stopped. I can’t make any guarantees.” The police officer’s pelvic bone had shattered severely, and the police had brought him to Kuake City Hospital from a distance of over 20 kilometers away. The golden timeframe for performing surgery had already passed.
“We absolutely must save his life. He is a hero in our city police. Tell me about anything that you need. Our hospital and the Kuake City government will give you anything that you require.
“These are some of the party leaders in our Kuake City Communist Party Committee,” Batu introduced the important-looking people to Zhang Fan. “Is it possible to save his life without performing surgery?” Batu inquired.
“It will be absolutely impossible to save his life without surgery. But even with surgery, it’s impossible to make any guarantees.”
“What are the odds that his life can be saved?” one of the party leaders asked Zhang Fan.
“Ten percent,” Zhang Fan answered.
“Is the doctor from the bigger city hospital not here yet? Have a police car go to pick him up, and turn on the police sirens! Hurry!” the party leader roared at one of his subordinates. This party leader was incredibly disappointed, and had no confidence in the medical level of Kuake City Hospital’s doctors.
“Leader, there’s a phone call for you from orthopedic surgery Director Gao from the city hospital.” The leader spoke only a few short sentences on the phone before hanging up. He then turned around to Batu. “Who’s Zhang Fan from your hospital? Director Gao is halfway here, and he recommended Zhang Fan to perform the surgery. He says that we should all follow Zhang Fan’s decisions.”
Gao Shijun was incredibly confident in Zhang Fan’s skills. If Zhang Fan was unable to do the surgery, then Gao Shijun felt that he would also have no guarantee.
“I happen to be Zhang Fan. Right now, the patient’s internal organs are beginning to fail. Saving him will be extremely unlikely.”
“Start the surgery. Even if there’s a very low chance, it’s still better than waiting for him to die. You must, you must...” The party leader then waved his hand, wanting Zhang Fan and the others to hurry and start the surgery.
“Superintendent! The patient’s heart has stopped again!” the director of internal medicine loudly shouted from inside the patient’s room. Zhang Fan hurriedly ran inside.
“Prepare the defibrillator. Director Zhang, prepare a cardiac stimulant. We’re going to directly inject it intravenously.” Zhang Fan immediately began to perform chest compressions. The director of internal medicine at Kuake City Hospital happened to share the surname of Zhang with Zhang Fan.
“His heartbeat is so weak. In such a situation, it’s likely for his heartbeat to instantly stop when the surgery begins,” Director Zhang said worriedly.
“If we don’t perform surgery, the patient is absolutely certain to die. If we perform surgery, the patient will still have a sliver of a chance. Let’s start immediately!”
“I’m unable to determine the blood pressure! Patient’s heartrate is 20!” Ma Lihua told Zhang Fan as she watched the electrocardiogram. She was feeling an immense amount of pressure due to all the police officers right outside the patient’s room. She felt like it was difficult for her to breathe. Not only that, but this patient was a hero of the police force.
“Begin the anesthesia! Wash hands and disinfect.” Zhang Fan gritted his teeth. Gao Shijun also arrived at this time, and swiftly joined Zhang Fan on the operating table after he disinfected himself.
“Hurry, we need to find the point of bleeding and stop the bleeding. Increase the amount of blood transfusion. Double the amount of the blood pressure increasing medicine.”
The left half of the patient’s pelvis was shattered severely. This was an extremely difficult surgery. Both Zhang Fan and Gao Shijun were sweating so much while performing the surgery that the assisting nurses weren’t even able to keep up with wiping their sweat.
“Patient’s heartbeat has stopped.”
“Cardiac stimulant!”
“It’s useless, we’re already administering the maximum dosage possible. We can’t increase it by any more.”
C Village, one of the smaller villages belonging to Kuake City’s district, had a gold mine. Thanks to the gold mine, C Village had an outstanding economy. Of course, this also attracted plenty of illegal prostitution, gambling, and drugs. Kuake City’s police force had been watching a drug gang for quite a while. Today, the Kuake City police force decided to bust the drug gang.
However, the police didn’t expect that this drug gang actually possessed guns and homemade bombs. The criminals furiously tried to break through the police barricade. Right as the criminals were about to succeed in breaking through the barricade, the heroic police officer on the operating table had used his own police car to crash into the criminals’ car. The criminals’ car had been illegally modified, and was driving at a high speed. Although the much lighter police car successfully stopped the criminals’ car, the police officer had been seriously injured.
In the end, Zhang Fan’s hands trembled as he lightly placed a white cloth used for covering the dead over the now deceased police officer patient. “I’m sorry, I tried my very best!” Zhang Fan whispered as tears dripped down his face.
“Stop those criminals!” Zhang Fan felt like he could hear the hero’s final words in his last moment!