Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Ling Ran began to perform surgeries at three oâclock in the morning. After he operated until noon, he drank an Energy Serum to reenergize himself, and continued to perform surgeries until ten oâclock at night. Only then did he consider himself to have finished the dayâs surgery.
As he watched the patient being pushed away, Ling Ran could not help but smile.
âDid you enjoy yourself?â Zuo Cidian could not even open his eyes. He had to drink two cans of Red Bull to stay awake.
Ling Ran nodded.
âAre you satisfied, content, and delighted?â Zuo Cidian asked again.
Ling Ran nodded.
âAre you feeling good?â Zuo Cidian asked one more time.
Ling Ran nodded.
Zuo Cidian was swaying, but even so, he did not forget to give Ling Ran a thumbs up. âDoctor Ling, your stamina is great. I didnât even perform all the surgeries with you. If I had followed you through all of them, I would most likely be exhausted to death.â
âIâm dead tired, even though Iâve just helped him with half of them.â Lu Wenbin had long since sprawled himself on the ground.
âSnoreâ¦â
Su Jiafu, who performed all the surgeries with Ling Ran that day, said nothing. He sat silently on a small stool and fell asleep on the table. He started snoring.
Ling Ran was still energetic, handsome, and elegant as if he was the epitome of elegance itself. He was extremely graceful.
Zuo Cidian, who was over forty years old, spoke in an envious tone, even though he would never be able to gain Ling Ranâs stamina. âThey say that youth is gold. My experiences as a young doctor were different from yours, but being young certainly has its advantages.â
âItâs absolutely useless.â Lu Wenbin moaned while he felt the soreness in his body. He said, âIâm still young, but look at me, Iâm tired as heck.â
Zuo Cidian glanced at Lu Wenbin as if he was looking at a village farm dog.
âSchedule tomorrowâs surgery.â Ling Ran interrupted both of them and said, âMake special remarks on the patients who bring their own hospital beds.â
âThere havenât been many patients who have brought their own beds over the past few days, but Iâm guessing that in the coming days, thereâll be more patients.â Zuo Cidian chuckled and said, âTreating the cadres is like digging out a ratâs lair. They come one after another. If you can handle them, they will come in groups.â
The circulating nurse who was drinking water spat out her water. âYou sure know how to phrase your words.â
âWhy wouldnât I dare? I didnât name anyone in particular. Iâm just speaking in general,â Zuo Cidian said and smiled humbly toward Ling Ran. âDoctor Ling, you have exhausted yourself after working for the entire day, go back first. Itâs fine to leave the rest to us.â
âOkay.â Ling Ran had no interest in cleaning up the mess. He turned around and said, âTomorrow morning we can start working a little later than usual. Letâs start at eight oâclock and do some ward rounds before we perform surgery.â
Zuo Cidian forced himself to smile.
When Ling Ran left, Zuo Cidian looked at his watch. He whispered, âItâs less than twelve hours before I have to work again.â
âThis is Doctor Lingâs normal schedule,â Lu Wenbin spoke in the tone of the eldest senior brother of a sect. There was even a hint of pride in his voice.
Zuo Cidian frowned slightly and said in a skilled manner, âWe are only assistants, we can still distribute our tasks among ourselves. Doctor Ling is the chief surgeon. Can he work continuously like this?â
âAs long as there are enough beds, he can.â Lu Wenbin glanced at Zuo Cidian and said, âYouâve opened Pandoraâs box. If these old cadres can each bring their own bed, Doctor Ling will go crazy performing surgeries. â
âCadres, not old cadres,â Zuo Cidian corrected Lu Wenbin.
âFine, cadres, then. But when you phrase it that way, does that mean that there were even more patients available?â
Zuo Cidian nodded solemnly.
âEven if there are a group of cadres, there wouldnât be too many who have injured their meniscus.â
âThen you must be underestimating our cadresâ ability in spreading the word.â
âNo way.â Lu Wenbin forced himself to chuckle.
Zuo Cidian nodded solemnly once again.
âDonât be like Doctor Ling.â The young nurse next to him refused to work anymore.
Before Zuo Cidian could react, Lu Wenbin flung the door open and rushed out. âIâll have to trouble all of you today, I have to go back and put away the stew.â
â¦..
The next day, at eight oâclock in the morning, Ling Ran began to do ward rounds with the members of his treatment group.
Lu Wenbin, Yu Yuan, and Zuo Cidian, who were in charge of the beds, briefed Ling Ran on the patientsâ conditions while they walked. The three interns anxiously looked forward to the question-and-answer session.
Ling Ran rarely talked when they had to face most of the âoldâ patients. Yu Yuan was responsible for the consultation and other matters.
This modal had actually trained Yu Yuanâs ability to do ward rounds.
In fact, before an attending physician was promoted to an associate chief physician, their most important ability of allâdoing ward roundsâwas honed when their treatment groups did just that. Yu Yuan also had an advantage as the one with the highest seniority.
That would have been unimaginable in other treatment groups or other hospitals.
The power within a treatment group was extremely large. If measured by numbers, a decent treatment group in a tertiary Grade A hospital would receive more than 10,000,000 RMB in a year. Before the medical reformation, if calculations were made based on medication prices at that time, which was 15% more than current medication prices, even a hospital would be able to make a legitimate profit of more than 1,000,000 RMB from patients in one year.
A treatment group with such resources would have no problems in either nurturing the people in their group or poaching people.
Therefore, most of the treatment groups were led by the chief physicians or associate chief physicians, and they were assigned with many attending physicians as well.
The hospitals that could not nurture their doctors into attending physicians and form a sufficient number of attending physicians would still have enough motivation and necessity to poach other doctors from other hospitals.
However, in Ling Ranâs treatment group, Yu Yuan, who had just become a chief resident, was the doctor with the highest seniority. Her title as a chief resident was not a job title, but only a position.
It was a great opportunity for petite Yu Yuan to patrol the wards as a chief resident, even though that task was supposed to be reserved for attending physicians only.
Ling Ran enjoyed the free time he had that day. This was especially so after he was transferred to the VIP patient building. Ling Ranâs attitude had become even colder.
He did not like direct contact with patients, and those gentlemen who brought their own beds with them were even further away from being classified as adorable and likable.
In comparison, Yu Yuanâs ability to forge interpersonal relationships with such people was much stronger.
Regardless of whether it was men, women, the elderly, or the young, they would always be kinder toward small animals.
Ling Ran silently listened to Yu Yuan while she asked some questions. Unless there was a problem, he would just let Yu Yuan take control of the rhythm of the conversation. Otherwise, he would take the extra effort to correct her.
After he went through the entire VIP patient building, Ling Ran did not even receive a single Sincere Gratitude Treasure Chest from any patient.
Ling Ran was also indifferent about the fact.
He was not in a hurry for a treasure chest. Instead, surgeries were where his passion lay.
When it was nine oâclock in the morning, Ling Ran finally returned to his beloved operating theater.
The operating theaterâs schedule for the day was also listed in the Operating Areaâs waiting room.
âThere are a total of eight operations.â Ling Ranâs tone could not be considered disappointed, but it was also not excited.
That surgical volume may have tired out other doctors and caused them die of fatigue. But for Ling Ran, it would need to depend on his condition before he decided whether he was so tired that he required an Energy Serum.
âOne M-Tang surgery, two Achilles tendon repairs, five knee arthroscopy surgeriesâ¦â Lu Wenbin made some calculations, and he actually felt a little disappointed.
âWe have no beds for our treatment group anymore. Today, four people brought their own beds. The remaining four people will need to use extra beds.â Yu Yuan delivered more bad news.
Zuo Cidian felt a little guilty. He said, âThe news hasnât made its way everywhere yet. I reckon that in a few days, the number of patients who bring their own beds will increase.â
âThe problem now is not about patients bringing their own beds. We donât even have enough beds of our own.â
âThe extra beds are almost full.â
âIf they need to be hospitalized over a long period of time, our bed turnover rate will definitely not increase.â
Everyone put their heads together, but they still could not think of a good solution.
Ling Ran changed into scrubs, put on a new pair of underwear, and listened to them as they talked. He then thought for a few seconds and said, âOur current solution would only be to reduce the patientsâ recovery time.â
âWe wonât be using the long-term hospitalization system anymore?â Zuo Cidian was the first to register his words. He did not quite understand the long-term or short-term hospitalization systems. He only knew that it was against the hospitalâs policy. Therefore, when he heard that Ling Ran had changed his mind, he immediately brought it up.
Ling Ran shook his head. âWe will adhere to the long-term hospitalization system, but we can consider reducing the time required for patients to recover while we operate on them.â
âWhile we operate on them?â
âWe can reduce blood loss, reduce operating time, and perform simpler and more accurate surgeriesâ¦â Ling Ran mentioned three factors in one breath before he paused for a moment and continued, âIf we can reduce the average hospitalization time by one day, we will be able to save a lot of beds with every one hundred patients.â
Zuo Cidian and the others were stunned as they listened.
âDoctor Ling, you always manage to think of new ways to deal with problems.â Zuo Cidian smiled on the outside, but he could not help but think, âIs this even a strategy? Heâs just someone with a sugar and ice personality!â