Associate Chief Physician Yao gazed at the patient on the operating table with a solemn expression. The scalpel felt so heavy, and he felt like a disloyal married man with four girlfriends who was holding the keys to the first girlfriend’s house.
Every single surgeon was familiar with bleeding control, and as an associate chief physician, Associate Chief Physician Yao did it all the time.
That was exactly why he knew how hard it was to deal with this patient’s hemorrhage.
Of course, it was easy to make an incision on the patient’s abdominal wall. But if he was unable to quickly and accurately find the bleeding point, the patient’s blood would flow out like a broken dam, until all his blood vessels were drained. It would be to the point that the blood would not be able to be replaced quickly enough even if blood was transfused into the veins of both his hands.
Associate Chief Physician Yao knew the feeling of how the success of something would be decided in a split second all too well. The pressure that came with it could kill a person.
He tightened his grip on the scalpel and glanced at Ling Ran. He decided to take a step backward. He said with a soft voice, “Doctor Ling, I’ll be performing laparotomy. Will you be executing bleeding control?”
Ling Ran was renowned in the hospital for his amazing bleeding control skills. As for laparotomy, it was nothing difficult, and it was only about as difficult as opening a door with a key. The decision made after the door was opened was more difficult. It was a matter of where to place his hand or the surgical instrument.
Even though the atmosphere in the operating theater was calm and Ling Ran was confident, Associate Chief Physician Yao would rather play it safe.
However, Ling Ran who was busy making commands had no intention of picking up the baton.
He quickly shook his head regretfully. “A new batch of ambulances will be arriving very soon, so you’ll have to do it.”
“Oh… alright.” There was nothing Associate Chief Physician Yao could do. Ling Ran had a good reason. And more importantly, the patient lying on the operating table belonged to him.
In other words, even though he wanted to avert responsibility, he was unable to do it completely.
“I’ll start performing laparotomy, then.” Associate Chief Physician Yao did not say much. As if he was opening a door, he quickly landed his scalpel on the patient’s abdomen and made an incision.
Compared with how things were before where Ling Ran ordered him to open the patient’s abdominal cavity right away, Ling Ran was doing things differently right now.
Associate Chief Physician Yao thought that it was quite a pity. ‘As expected, Doctor Ling has grown as a person. Unlike before, he’s no longer…’
That was when Ling Ran spoke. “Try your best to keep the incision closer to the crotch area. After slicing open the peritoneum, you can insert your hand into the abdominal cavity and move it to the right. See if you can find the bleeding point. I reckon that it should be thirty degrees from the midline…”
Associate Chief Physician Yao froze for a moment. ‘Such detail!’
However, there was no time for him to ask any questions.
Associate Chief Physician Yao held his breath a little. He started focusing all his attention on the patient the way he used to put his full focus on his exam papers during examinations.
No matter how much a person prepared himself before an examination and no matter what kind of good or bad things he had predicted, the moment he entered the examination hall, he could only depend on himself. And no matter what kind of accident befell him, he would have no choice but to accept it calmly.
It was the same when it came to surgeries.
Before Associate Chief Physician Yao performed the incision, all kinds of thoughts ran through his mind. He tried to avert responsibility and look for help. But right after he started making the incision, all these were in the past.
All had been said and done…
And his performance in the operating theater would decide the final outcome of the surgery.
Associate Chief Physician Yao made an incision with his eyebrows furrowed and ordered his assistants to aspirate. He then did as Ling Ran had said and slowly inserted his hand into the patient’s abdominal cavity.
Associate Chief Physician Yao was neither experienced nor confident when it came to barehanded bleeding control. Hence, he was doing it quite slowly, and he was hesitant throughout the process.
Fortunately, Ling Ran did not say anything about it, and Associate Chief Physician Yao breathed an internal sigh of relief.
It would be embarrassing for him to have Ling Ran point out his flaw.
“Have you found the bleeding point?” Ling Ran’s voice rang out from behind.
“Still looking for it.” Associate Chief Physician Yao continued looking for the bleeding point. ‘There’s so much blood inside, and I can’t see anything. How is it possible for me to find the bleeding point in such a short time?’
Ling Ran furrowed his eyebrows a little. He waved and summoned the Virtual Human. He looked at where Associate Chief Physician Yao’s hand was and made an incision on the Virtual Human. He then dug around the abdominal cavity before dismissing the Virtual Human.
He could only get more time to use the Virtual Human courtesy of Intermediate Treasure Chests, so he tried to minimize its usage as much as possible. On the other hand, he could drink Energy Serums whenever he wanted to.
“Associate Chief Physician Yao, can you position your index finger parallel to your arm and move it forward by 0.3 inches?” Ling Ran told Associate Chief Physician Yao where the bleeding point was according to what he had seen in the Virtual Human’s abdominal cavity.
“Oh… alright.” Associate Chief Physician Yao was not convinced that Ling Ran could determine the position of the bleeding point so correctly from a distance, but he did not stubbornly refuse to follow Ling Ran’s instruction. There was no harm in trying. The patient’s abdominal cavity was full of blood right now anyway, and he could not see a thing.
Associate Chief Physician Yao flexed his index finger a little and looked at Ling Ran.
“Bend it before straightening it.” Ling Ran thought that Associate Chief Physician Yao was asking him about the maneuver.
Associate Chief Physician Yao smiled as he bent and straightened his index finger.
Associate Chief Physician Yao could feel a slight pressure on his fingertip. It was a sensation that he never would have missed.
Associate Chief Physician Yao did not even have time to stop smiling before he quickly applied force using his index finger by straightening it.
“I found it!” Associate Chief Physician Yao gasped. He was kind of pleasantly surprised.
He had always depended on visual observation when it came to barehanded bleeding control. Aside from this, major bleeding points like this were rarely dealt with using barehanded bleeding control.
Associate Chief Physician Yao only had to move his finger a little, and he was able to complete a task that had seemed arduous to him. Right now, he felt like a student who had correctly spotted the questions that came out during an examination. He also felt like a student who saw scribbles that matched the answer to a question perfectly during an examination.
“Make sure that you don’t use too much force.” Ling Ran wore a calm expression. He turned to ask the anesthetist. “Quickly transfuse blood. We have a BP reading?”
“Yes. I’m transfusing blood.” The anesthetist was also in a daze.
He usually assisted in surgeries carried out by doctors from the Orthopedics Department and Associate Chief Physician Yao. He had never heard something like this before, let alone seen it.
It was no news in Yun Hua Hospital that Ling Ran was good at barehanded bleeding control. But when it came to instructing another person on how to find the bleeding point… At least, the anesthetist knew that Associate Chief Physician Yao was not capable of this. He knew this all too well.
The operating theater was rather quiet.
Ling Ran stood quietly and watched as the anesthetist replenished the patient’s fluid and blood…
“If there’s no other problem, I’ll take my leave first.” Unlike usual, Ling Ran did not touch the patient from the beginning to the end. But his state of mind was the same.
Associate Chief Physician Yao turned to glance at the screen so that he did not have to meet eyes with Ling Ran.
He was far from calm right now.
His hand was still soaked in the patient’s blood, and his fingertip was still rested on the patient’s ruptured blood vessel. This was a very normal thing for surgeons. But when he recalled what had just happened, Associate Chief Physician Yao was unable to say anything normal.
*Swish*
Ling Ran nodded and left the operating theater, back to the frontline of the Emergency Medical Center.
Associate Chief Physician Yao lowered his head again and widened the incision. After the aspirators served their purpose, he looked at the bleeding point and started stitching it up.
He was stitching it up very slowly. Not only was it because the ruptured blood vessel was located in a bad position which made things a little difficult, but it was also because he failed to calm himself down.
He could not help but recall what had just happened, and he felt as if someone was asking him if he had just operated on the patient under Ling Ran’s guidance like a resident doctor.
