Great Doctor Ling Ran

Panda Novel

“I want to operate on patients with only cholecystitis. Let’s forget about those with bile duct problems.” Ling Ran looked carefully at the medical records of the four patients with cholecystitis who were referred to him by Zhang Anmin after he completed all the scheduled hepatectomy. He then decisively decided not to operate on one of them.

Zhang Anmin naturally agreed with everything Ling Ran said.

Truth be told, it was quite a challenge for him to gather four patients with cholecystitis in one go, as he had to talk to quite a few people.

Even though the process was troublesome, Zhang Anmin was surprised by how willing these doctors were to let Ling Ran have those patients.

After all, Ling Ran was practically snatching those patients from them.

If this were to happen in the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery in the past, a heated argument would ensue in the best case scenario, and people would be swinging their fists at one another in the worst case scenario. This was the case in the past, and nothing had changed since then.

Under ordinary circumstances, doctors would never lay hands on other doctors’ patients. Even if they wanted to, the other doctors would not allow them to do so.

However, whenever Zhang Anmin asked for patients from other doctors on Ling Ran’s behalf, he had almost never been rejected. Some of those doctors were probably unhappy about it, but Zhang Anmin could not care less.

Zhang Anmin felt extremely good to be able to act so recklessly. It was as if he was a fox backed up by a tiger.

While he was at it, Zhang Anmin could not help but whip out his phone and watched the video of Ling Ran performing an emergency hepatectomy again.

The video was very short. It was less than thirty seconds.

The first half of the video showed Ling Ran observing the patient’s abdominal cavity. He then said something, lifted the liver, and plucked off one of its lobes. He then returned the liver to the patient’s abdominal cavity and sutured it.

Zhang Anmin intended to take an informative video showing how emergency hepatectomy was performed.

An ordinary associate chief physician usually took ten minutes to carry out an emergency hepatectomy. Some of them would even take up to twenty or thirty minutes. Emergency hepatectomies were naturally a lot more crude compared to ordinary hepatectomy, and the prognosis of the patient involved would also be far worse. The only advantage of emergency hepatectomy was that the patient would have a higher chance of surviving the surgery.

As a junior attending physician in the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery, Zhang Anmin’s best shot at being a chief surgeon of a liver surgery was for emergency hepatectomy. This was how many of the attending physicians started carrying out liver surgeries. Sometimes, in the middle of the night when there was only a junior attending physician on shift in the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery, there would suddenly be a call from the Emergency Department asking for an emergency consultation.

However, never had Zhang Anmin thought that he would be the witness of an emergency hepatectomy that took merely seconds.

“Doctor Ling.” Zhang Anmin could no longer hold himself back and said in a hushed tone, “I took a video when you were performing a hepatectomy.”

“The one just now?”

“Not the scheduled one before this. The one where you helped out in the Digestive Surgery Department.”

“Oh,” Ling Ran said.

“Can I, erm, show the video to other people?” Zhang Anmin was being very careful. He had wanted to say this for quite a while, and there was no one else he could consult about it.

The process of the surgery was way too unorthodox, to the point that Zhang Anmin was not knowledgeable enough to tell whether it was normal.

If Ling Ran did not carry out the surgery in a conventional manner, it was better for Zhang Anmin not to alert anyone about it. The patient was cured, anyway, and showing the video to other people would only raise suspicion.

Ling Ran knew what Zhang Anmin meant. He nodded and said, “It’s just an emergency hepatectomy. You can show it to other people.”

“Oh, okay.” Zhang Anmin licked his lips and continued in a hushed tone. “Can I send it to the group chat of the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery too?”

“Sure,” Ling Ran answered in a very straightforward manner.

He never wasted any time dwelling on matters related to interpersonal relationships, as it would just be a lost cause.

“Get the patients who would be receiving cholecystectomy ready. After you are sure about the time, give me their bed number,” Ling Ran said and prepared to leave.

Zhang Anmin agreed to it. He then asked in surprise, “Are you going to meet the patients?”

Most surgeons were unwilling to meet their patients right before surgery. This was especially true when it came to Ling Ran.

Ling Ran merely nodded and said, “I’m only a novice in cholecystectomy. So, I need to get as many references as possible. I’ll go and perform a physical examination on all of them.”

Zhang Anmin laughed out loud. “Doctor Ling, you’re being way too humble. You’re almost as good as me now when it comes to cholecystectomy.

Ling Ran said solemnly, “And that’s why I said that I’m only a novice.”

Lu Wenbin started laughing loudly the moment Ling Ran exited the place. “Doctor Ling likes to tell the truth.”

“Hm.” Zhang Anmin glanced at the door. He suddenly smiled, raised his phone, and said, “Can you believe this? Doctor Ling just admitted that I’m almost as good as him in cholecystectomy.”

Lu Wenbin let out a prolonged hum.

“I’m almost as good as Doctor Ling in cholecystectomy. Heh.” Zhang Anmin started giggling as he spoke.

As he giggled, he sent the video where Ling Ran finished performing an emergency hepatectomy in ten seconds to the WeChat group of the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery.

Like many WeChat groups that had been around for a long time, all kinds of weird voice notes and videos would be forwarded to the WeChat group of the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery.

Hence, not many people watched the video Zhang Anmin just sent.

Zhang Anmin then followed up with a text message. [Doctor Ling performed a hepatectomy in around ten seconds just now.]

A few people were chatting casually in the group, but suddenly, everyone went silent.

[Where?] He Yuanzheng replied.

[He helped out in the Digestive Surgery Department.] There were no other people in the video Zhang Anmin took.

Of course, he had no intention of covering things up for Associate Chief Physician Liu.

“He helped out? This wasn’t planned?” He Yuanzheng directly sent a voice note to the group chat.

Zhang Anmin replied with another text message. [There wasn’t any prior preparation. A patient in the Digestive Surgery Department was suffering from hepatic hemorrhage.]

Only after sending the text message did Zhang Anmin have a sudden realization. ‘There’s nothing wrong with the video, but the context is problematic!’

The Digestive Surgery Department did not seek out He Yuanzheng or the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery for help when they encountered a problem during their surgery. They sought out Ling Ran instead. He Yuanzheng obviously did not like the fact that such a video was sent to the group chat of the department.

“What were you laughing about?” Lu Wenbin suddenly asked.

The corners of Zhang Anmin’s lips twitched a few times. “I was thinking about making a few more trips to Bazhaixiang hospital branch if I have nothing to do.”

“Why? Did you meet someone special there?” Lu Wenbin started giggling as he spoke.

Zhang Anmin looked into the other party’s eyes before glancing at his phone. He saw that no one else in the group chat of the Department of Hepatobiliary and Pancreatic Surgery had spoken. He then slipped his phone into his pocket and said, “Just for money’s sake. I get to make 2,000 RMB every time I go there. This sum of money might be nothing for you, but to me, it’s a lot.”

Lu Wenbin smiled. “When you start making a lot of money, you’ll realize that money means nothing.”

Zhang Anmin threw Lu Wenbin a sidelong glance. “A man without foresight will have immediate worries. Even though we enjoy immense job security as doctors, we might very well lose our jobs one day. Just take a look at what had been happening lately. Someone got fired for receiving gifts from patients, and another got fired for getting commissions from the sales of drugs. Someone was even fired because he was framed by his superior.”

“Framed by his superior? Which one?”

“That one,” Zhang Anmin said and rose. He searched through his contact list for Xiang Xueming’s number.

Lu Wenbin shook his head in frustration. “Let me tell you this. At some point of time, after you make a lot of money, you’ll realize that your bank account balance is just a string of numbers and that it is meaningless. There’s no need to be anxious about money. Relax a little.”

As Lu Wenbin spoke, his phone started ringing.

Lu Wenbin answered the call with a smile. A few seconds later, his smile faded. “You guys ran out of stock? Are you kidding me? Quick, get someone to retrieve more pork trotters from the storeroom, if you guys don’t do this before the lunch hour ends, I’ll fire all of you!”