Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
It was quite a shocking sight for an extraordinarily handsome doctor to be walking into the ward, shadowed by a middle-aged doctor, a couple of doctors who were doing their in-service training, and several medical interns.
“This is Doctor Ling, the leader of our treatment group.” Zuo Cidian stood forward and introduced Ling Ran to the patient and his family members so that they would not mistake him for the leader.
In the hospital, doctors who were older usually had a higher position, and this kind of misunderstanding was unavoidable. The first few times this happened, Zuo Cidian felt pretty good about it. But now, it gave him nothing but sorrow.
“Doctor Ling?” The patient who was talking about how much he was craving for a steamed bun sized Ling Ran up. He then said a little bashfully, “All the doctors in the General Surgery Department are at least thirty or forty years old, and some are even fifty.”
“But Doctor Ling is more skillful than them,” Zuo Cidian said without hesitation, and the way he was talking about it in such a straightforward manner shocked the patient and his family member a little.
Ordinary people would not say anything like that, would they?
“I’ve already taken a look at all your scans. I’ll perform a physical examination for you now,” Ling Ran said and started washing his hand with some alcohol based hand sanitizer.
This was Ling Ran’s favorite thing to do when he made ward rounds.
This was one of the very few things he liked that involved physical contact, as he was able to get a good grasp of the condition of the patients’ bodies by doing so.
Physical examination was the most basic method of examination. But in modern medicine, the value of physical examination had been replaced by CT scans, X-rays, MRIs, pathological examinations, urine examinations, stool examinations, sperm count tests, and other such tests.
However, physical examination was still a valuable skill to possess.
To be more politically correct, physical examinations could pick up some of the symptoms and problems that could not be detected by modern machines.
And Ling Ran preferred to conduct physical examination so that he could get a complete picture of the patient’s condition in his mind.
Not all patients were suitable candidates for a full-body checkup, and not all of them were willing to do it either. For example, the patient before Ling Ran had hesitated for a long time about receiving an MRI scan.
Comparatively, it was a more straightforward solution to carry out a physical examination. Aside from this, it was cheap and effective.
“Come over and give it a try too.” After Ling Ran was done, he gestured at Ren Qi and Ye Sigong to conduct a physical examination for the patient too.
The patient’s belly was a little large, and it was exposed. The patient seemed a little uneasy as he watched Ren Qi, who was of medium build. His lips quivered a little before he finally asked his question “Um… do you charge money for this examination of yours?”
This question stunned the doctors who were prepared to be tested by Ling Ran.
The nurse by the side smiled and said, “No, we won’t be charging you.”
The patient smiled in embarrassment before he said, “It’s good that you don’t. I was worried that I’ll end up owing you and not be able to clear my debt to the hospital. The medicine fees in hospitals are so expensive, and so are the examination fees. You won’t be able to get anything from them either. I just want to finish my surgery earlier so that I can go back home to rest, is that possible?”
“We’ll make arrangements later.” Zuo Cidian did not want Ling Ran to answer this question. He turned his head around to speak to the family member. “Are you already in debt with the hospital?”
He was not actually pressing them to pay their fees, but when he said this, the patient did indeed not press the issue. Instead, she hastily explained her situation. “I haven’t paid what I owed today. My family is already borrowing money. Once we get that sum, we will definitely pay it.”
Zuo Cidian shrugged in Ling Ran’s direction.
They had all seen similar patients before. Even though the current new rural cooperative medical insurance could help farmers claim a certain amount of medical fees, the remaining amount was still a huge sum that was difficult to bear for certain people.
The doctors from the General Surgery Department were also able to decipher the situation. Hence, when the Emergency Department asked for the patient, they immediately handed him over.
It could be said that the patient before them was a poor patient who was meticulously chosen for their aim.
“Could we receive the surgery first before we pay the treatment fees after we get the money?” The family’s thought process was also led astray, and she was now in conflict because of the issue with money as well.
Ling Ran spoke without hesitation, “Of course, but you will need to get prepared. We will perform the surgery for you in the afternoon.”
The family member did not expect that things would go so smoothly. She was stunned for a moment, and she only thanked Ling Ran after her dad slapped her.
Ling Ran gave her a socially-acceptable smile before he asked Ren Qi, “Which part are you touching now, and what do you feel?”
Ren Qi quickly answered, “There’s a lump where my hand is.”
“Continue.” Ling Ran nodded. He was satisfied with Ren Qi’s foundation of skills.
No matter what, Ren Qi had been a doctor for ten years. Even though the number of surgeries he did was low and his surgical index was also low, he had still learned many things.
The patient and his family calmed down slightly. When they looked at the doctors moving about in a busy fashion, they started to look forward to the treatment.
Once Ling Ran and the in-service training doctors examined the patient, they announced an end to the ward round. After they bade farewell to the patient and his family, they turned around to leave.
The interns and in-service training doctors who were left behind at the door or were situated close to the corridor quickly left the room so that they could make space for Ling Ran.
Ling Ran took a few steps forward. Once he reached the entrance, he thought for a while before he turned around to the nurse and said, “Try to reduce the nursing fees charged to the patient over here.”
“Don’t worry about it, Doctor Ling.” The nurse smiled sweetly and formed a heart shape with her hands.
The patient and his family had clearly heard Ling Ran’s words. After he left, they quickly asked, “Could you really charge us less for the nursing fees?”
“Since your situation is special, I’ll just make an application with the head nurse for you. If the application goes through, you won’t be charged for oxygen and the likes.” The nurse gave him a half-truth.
Since Ling Ran had already spoken, there was naturally no need for her to even go through the head nurse. However, there were a few patients in the room itself, and the nurse had to take care of the other people’s emotions. Hence, she deliberately made the situation sound more complicated.
In truth, many of the expenditures of the patients in this room, such as their dressing, examinations, injections, and the likes, were all recorded by the nurses so that they could charge the patients.
The bill for the fees of those who stayed in the hospital for a long period of time would contain all these details filled in by these nurses.
With how busy tertiary Grade A hospitals were, these bills could be recorded in great detail, but also in an incredibly perfunctory state. It was entirely normal for the nursing fees for a single bed to spot a difference of hundreds of RMB up to one thousand RMB between different departments and hospitals.
If they reduced the nursing fees for patients who might not be able to pay the bills, they could also reduce the possibility of them being penalized by the pharmaceutical sales companies.
Even though the patient could not understand these, he was still rather happy when he learned that he did not need to spend so much money. “If we don’t need to pay for oxygen, I can use the oxygen tube. Let’s try it. I want to see just what’s so good about it that they’d charge the patients with every hour we use it.”
The daughter did not know whether she wanted to laugh or cry when she hooked the oxygen tube back onto her father’s nose. Then, she sighed and whispered, “Dad, we’re in the hospital now, so don’t worry about money. Just take care of yourself, and it’ll already be great if you can get discharged as soon as possible. We can return the money we borrowed from others slowly in the future.”
“If we can save even just a little, it’s still money saved. You have to work long hours to earn money, and you even have to work overtime. It’s not easy for you to earn money, I know that…” The old father breathed in oxygen as he spoke, and soon, he fell asleep.
