Great Doctor Ling Ran

In the recovery room, the middle-aged woman from Shanghai slowly opened her eyes.

The ceiling was pure white, and so were the bed sheets. The place looked like one of those scenes in a science fiction movie, where aliens dissected human beings, when the world had ended, or when serial killers tortured their subjects. Of course, only adolescents who believed themselves to have superpowers or silly youngsters who liked to watch horror movies would think of it that way.

The brains of patients who just woke up after anesthesia could not function at their full capacity. The first thought that came into the middle-aged woman’s mind was the biggest fear in her life. ‘Did a thief steal everything in my house?’

“Hubby… Hubby!” the middle-aged woman started shouting, and she tried to sit up.

“Aunty, you’re not allowed to sit up after regional anesthesia.” The anesthetist immediately went forward and held the middle-aged woman down.

“I remember you.” The middle-aged woman immediately realized what had happened when she saw the anesthetist.

Patients who woke up after general anesthesia would often experience a momentary loss of memory, but it was rarely seen in patients who woke up after regional anesthesia. Even if it happened every now and then, the condition would not persist for long.

The anesthetist still wanted to give it a shot. He pretended to flash an honest smile and said, “Aunty, do you remember telling me that you were going to introduce a friend’s daughter to me?”

“Did I say that?” The middle-aged woman was shocked.

“There’s no rush. I’ll examine you first.” The anesthetist flashed a slight smile.

Usually, anesthetists would ask patients who had just woken up after anesthesia a few questions. One, it was to check if they were sober. Two, it was to hear their voices and make sure that their larynxes, lungs, and other organs were functioning normally.

The most common ones were questions such as, “What is your name?” Even though it sounded dumb to most people, when patients could not remember their names no matter how hard they tried after waking up from anesthesia, it was a serious matter.

Of course, there had also been patients who pretended to forget their own names to make a fool out of everyone else. Patients who played such jokes were considered as dumb as those who could not remember their own names for real.

The anesthetist, whose surname was not Pan and who loved administering anesthetics to Dalangs, coughed a few times and said, “Aunty, I’ll ask you a few questions, and you have to answer me, all right?”

“Okay.”

“What’s my name?” The anesthetist whose surname was not Pan tweaked the question a little. He then flashed the nurse anesthetist a smug smile while he was at it and thought to himself, ‘I refuse to believe that you won’t introduce the girl to me…’

As expected, the middle-aged woman from Shanghai did not know what to say. She stared at the anesthetist whose surname was not Pan, her eyes wide with shock. He was kind of pleased with himself. She held her head in her hands and tried very hard to recall what she said. She then arduously said, “You’re the drug doctor who hasn’t gotten a wife even after working for more than ten years. You’re from Shanghai, and you live with your parents because you don’t have a house of your own. You’ve bought a small shop lot somewhere, and you stay in the hospital all the time and rarely go home. You have a car too, right?”

“I’m an anesthetist!” If it were not for the fact that he had received nine years of mandatory education, went through three years of high school, five years of undergraduate studies, three years of postgraduate studies, and developed good manners after studying for a total of twenty years, the anesthetist whose surname was not Pan would have made the woman his enemy!

…..

Ling Ran carried out surgery after surgery. He alternated between Achilles tendon repair surgeries, Plan A, and arthroscopy. Every now and then, patients with severed fingers would also be sent to him.

Two days later, all the hospital beds in the Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Center were occupied.

Early in the morning…

Ji Tianlu patrolled the wards with a solemn expression.

All the double-bedded rooms and triple-bedded rooms now had additional beds in them. They had become four-bedded rooms or even six-bedded rooms. Even though those additional beds were still empty, since Ling Ran had carried out eighty surgeries within two days, Ji Tianlu really did not know how much longer those additional beds would last them.

The head nurse of the nursing department walked behind Ji Tianlu, and her expression was even more solemn than Ji Tianlu’s. She said, “All our nurses have started to work overtime lately. Remember to pay them for the overtime, or else, there won’t be anyone taking care of the patients if you clinicians add more hospital beds.”

“We’ll definitely pay them for working overtime.” Ji Tianlu paused for a moment and asked, “Is it a lot?”

The head nurse reported the sum to him in a soft voice and continued, “You have to notify Academician Zhu. If he doesn’t give you the go-ahead, those responsible for the payment might not agree to pay the nurses for working overtime.”

Ji Tianlu’s eyelids twitched a few times. “Noted,” he said. He then remained silent.

Zhu Tongyi referred to international standards when he established the Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Center. The staff to patient ratio, number of hospital beds, and the sum of money paid to staff who worked overtime also followed international standards. However, he did make some changes to adapt those standards to local ones.

As a research center with only about thirty doctors and a hundred nurses, the Orthopedic and Sports Medicine center was rather generous when it came to overtime pay because it did not cost them a lot anyway. It also served as a good example for doctors who were there for in-service training, internship, and meetings.

Of course, due to current circumstances, the research center would need to fork out a larger sum of money for overtime pay. However, Ji Tianlu did not care about that.

Public general hospitals were not profit-seeking institutions to begin with. They did not mind forking out some money as long as it did not cause them huge losses.

After the head nurse talked to Ji Tianlu, she could not help but feel much more relaxed. She became a lot less aversive towards the matter of additional beds. She then changed the topic and said, “Our ward area’s already spacious in the first place. If we follow what other hospitals do and fill the corridors up with hospital beds, it’s possible for us to add about two hundred more beds.”

“So, we can bring the total amount up to four hundred?”

“Yes.”

“Four hundred beds… Our hospital’s doctors need the beds too.” Ji Tianlu calculated quietly. ‘Our research center has around thirty doctors, and all of them need a rough total of fifty beds every day. During peak periods, they may need a total of more than seventy beds. If I assume that those doctors only need fifty beds every day, and let Ling Ran have the remaining three hundred and fifty beds…’

Ji Tianlu could not help but spit, “This is madness.”

“Four hundred beds are indeed too many!” The head nurse laughed out loud too. “We won’t even be able to finish three hundred beds.”

“I thought so too.” Ji Tianlu shook his head and said, “I’ll get someone to renovate the vacant portion of the ward area.

“Seriously?” The head nurse was extremely surprised.

“Hmm… I’ve already consulted Academician Zhu about this matter. In the future, our center will organize more and more international conferences, and there’ll be more researchers visiting our center. We can’t just empty out our hospital beds every time that happens. Our center’s wards were designed to be like those single-bed rooms in Europe and the United States. Each patient occupies a small room. This facilitates treatment and also makes it easier for the patients’ family members to accompany them. So, we’ll now renovate the vacant portion of the ward area, and use those newly built rooms as single-bedded wards during ordinary times. When someone like… Ling Ran comes along, we’ll also have more space for additional beds.”

The head nurse listened as Ji Tianlu explained the situation to her. She laughed out loud. “After those newly-built rooms are done, together with the additional beds, we may even be able to have five hundred beds in total. It would be enough for our hospital to rise in the rankings.”

Ji Tianlu thought of something, but he did not say it out loud.

The Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Center built by Zhu Tongyi prioritized quality over quantity. However, in China, it was a sin for a hospital to only have a small number of hospital beds. Hence, the existing rooms were converted from single-bedded rooms to rooms with multiple beds, which was why half the ward was sealed up to serve as backup.

Ji Tianlu’s views were slightly different from Zhu Tongyi’s. Hence, he would be happy to see changes happen to the Orthopedic and Sports Medicine Center because of Ling Ran’s appearance.

After Ji Tianlu left the ward area, he went to take a look at the operating area. He watched as Ling Ran recited the table of square roots, from “1.414” and “1.732” to “4.472”. He then observed how Ling Ran dissected a banana to show that his hands were still steady before turning back to his office.

He received a phone call not long after he sat down.

“Good day, Chief Physician Ji. My name is Mai Chun, and I’m a pharmaceutical sales representative from Yunli Medical Company. I’ve heard that your center’s about to expand your ward area. We would like to pay you a visit in relation to this.” Even though the pharmaceutical sales representative on the other side of the line sounded quite young, Ji Tianlu was extremely shocked when he heard what she said.

“How did you find out that we intend to build new rooms?” Ji Tianlu asked.

“We provide extremely speedy and high-quality services, plus our prices are also very reasonable,” Mai Chun said sincerely. She was determined to complete the task that her bosses gave her.