Overpowered Resident Doctor

Chapter 667: Chapter 666: Official Debut

At 1:35 PM on Tuesday, the debridement surgery on Liao Zili’s old right lower leg injury, with Yan Feifan as the lead surgeon, officially began in Operating Room 3 of the trauma surgery department.

For this surgery, Yan Feifan used his own team, including scrub nurse Meng Yao, circulating nurse Ye Lin, and surgical assistant Yu Beihua.

As for the anesthesiologist, Yan Feifan had to borrow one from the trauma surgery department for the time being.

The one assisting Yan Feifan today was a thirty-five-year-old associate chief physician who was said to have relatively extensive clinical experience.

It was the first time Yan Feifan had cooperated with this particular anesthesiologist.

Yan Feifan didn’t know much about him. ’I’ll just have to put him on the observation list for now...’

The surgery began. Yan Feifan first incised the skin covering the scar on the patient’s right lower leg, revealing the bright red muscle tissue.

To be fair, judging solely by how the muscle had healed, Yan Feifan had to admit that the surgeon who had initially treated the patient’s wound was quite skilled.

Of course, when measured against his own standards, Yan Feifan still found a few areas that could have been improved.

The most obvious were three spots where the sutured muscle bundles had become entangled, forming rather large keloids.

’These keloids could have been avoided, or at least been significantly smaller!’

This wasn’t the time for Yan Feifan to deal with these keloids. He was merely using them to make a preliminary judgment of the original surgeon’s skill level.

This gave him a clear picture of the situation.

Frankly, Yan Feifan wasn’t confident that this debridement surgery alone would completely eliminate the severe, unexplained pain the patient had been experiencing in his lower leg for the past two or three years.

However, after seeing the original surgeon’s skill level, Yan Feifan was confident that this thorough surgical debridement would at least make the patient’s right lower leg feel a little lighter and more flexible.

The surgery continued. Using a scalpel and retractors, Yan Feifan pulled apart the patient’s muscle tissue, completely exposing the injured tibia.

Next, Yan Feifan reached out and used his fingers to carefully feel, inch by inch, the condition of the injured tibia’s recovery.

He suspected the unexplained pain was caused by the bone injury.

Generally, pain from even a severe muscle injury tends to diminish as the wound heals over time.

But bone injuries were a different matter.

The periosteum, which covers the bone, has a vast network of nerve endings.

If a bone spur were to develop and irritate the periosteum, the pain would gradually worsen day by day until it became unbearable.

Many late-stage bone cancer patients, in a sense, are literally pained to death.

As Yan Feifan carefully palpated the bone, he could clearly feel the marks of hyperplasia where the fracture had healed.

’But the surface of this protruding healed hyperplasia is very smooth. It shouldn’t be irritating the periosteum and causing pain...’

Huh...?

Suddenly, at the third healed fracture line, Yan Feifan felt a small, somewhat abrupt protrusion.

A jolt of excitement went through Yan Feifan...

After a thorough top-to-bottom examination, Yan Feifan found a total of three suspicious little bumps on the patient’s tibia.

One of them was located nearly three centimeters below a line of fracture hyperplasia, on a section of bone that was completely uninjured.

After examining the bone, Yan Feifan used a scalpel to incise the periosteum and clean up the three suspicious protrusions.

The first two were just some abnormal bone hyperplasia from the healing process.

But at the third spot, the one that felt most unusual to Yan Feifan, he made a major discovery.

With a pair of forceps, he extracted a small, very hard, sesame-seed-sized fragment that was embedded in the bone’s surface.

The small fragment was coated in some connective tissue and blood, so Yan Feifan couldn’t see it clearly. He handed it to Yu Beihua to identify.

About twenty minutes later, Yu Beihua, having re-sterilized and scrubbed in, returned to the operating table.

"Teacher, the tests confirmed it. That fragment is a piece of a tooth."

"A tooth fragment?"

Yan Feifan was quite surprised. "What the hell? How did a tooth fragment get inside the patient’s lower leg and end up embedded in his tibia?"

Unable to figure it out immediately, Yan Feifan stopped thinking about it and continued with the surgery.

He finished debriding the tibia and then proceeded to work from the inside out, layer by layer, tidying up the tangled or displaced muscles, blood vessels, and nerves...

The three-year-old injury had fewer issues to debride and improve than Yan Feifan had anticipated.

The surgery, originally expected to take five and a half hours and end at 7:00 PM, was finished an hour ahead of schedule by Yan Feifan.

At 6:13 PM, Yan Feifan came out of the operating area and handed a small, flat, transparent specimen box to the patient’s father.

"This was found on your son’s leg bone. I’ve already confirmed under a microscope that it’s a small tooth fragment."

The patient’s older brother, Liao Ziqiang, leaned in, looked at the specimen box, and asked doubtfully, "This tiny little tooth fragment is what caused my brother unbearable pain?"

Yan Feifan said bluntly, "That can’t be confirmed. We can only say it’s a possibility."

Liao Ziqiang looked at Yan Feifan and questioned him, "How could such a small tooth fragment get onto my brother’s leg bone?"

"That’s just ridiculous, isn’t it?"

"You didn’t just grab a random specimen to pass off as your surgical result to fool us, did you?"

Yan Feifan gave the guy a look like he was an idiot, snorted disdainfully, and couldn’t be bothered to explain anything to the family. He turned and went straight back into the operating area.

He went back to the operating area to change his clothes. When he came out again, he wore a cold expression and ignored the patient’s father, who had come over to apologize. He left the trauma surgery department directly and took a car back to Zuimo Court.

As for Yu Beihua, he still had to handle the patient’s post-operative matters and would need about another hour to finish his work.

Yan Feifan and Feng Jian returned to the residence together, where they met Duan Yu’s boyfriend, a chef named Mo Xiaolei.

He was a young man of about twenty-six or twenty-seven, nearly 1.8 meters tall, with a sturdy build but not at all fat.

His looks could only be described as average, but he was easy on the eyes.

The constant smile on his face made him seem somewhat simple, honest, and likable.

Besides him, Wang Chuan was also there.

Duan Yu had brought him many gifts from the United States that Auntie Zhong Xinyi had sent for him and Yanyan.

Wang Chuan had come over to express his thanks and, while he was at it, freeload a dinner.

The group didn’t wait for Yu Beihua. As soon as Yan Feifan had washed up, they started dinner.

After a few bites of food, Yan Feifan asked directly, "Mo Xiaolei, do you have any plans for your future?"

Mo Xiaolei glanced at Duan Yu. After receiving an encouraging look from her, he met Yan Feifan’s gaze and first gave an embarrassed smile.

"I only have a high school education, and to be honest, my grades in high school weren’t that great. I started training as a chef right after I graduated."

"Don’t laugh, but even though I’ve been a chef for seven or eight years, my skills are just so-so. I definitely couldn’t run my own restaurant. I’m pretty much just good enough to handle cafeteria food."

"Duan Yu and I discussed it..."

Mo Xiaolei glanced at Duan Yu again and said softly, "If it’s possible, could I work as a chef in the hospital cafeteria?"

Wang Chuan spoke up, "The hospital cafeterias are actually all outsourced to private catering companies."

"Why not join the hospital’s logistics department? You could use your professional experience to supervise the quality of the cafeteria’s food."

Mo Xiaolei said with some concern, "My education level is low. I’m afraid I wouldn’t do a good job!"

Yan Feifan looked at Duan Yu. Seeing no objection from her, he made the decision.

"Then you can start in the hospital’s logistics department and give it a try..."

Yan Feifan added reassuringly, "Mo Xiaolei, a lot of the work in logistics isn’t very difficult. You’ll pick it up after a little training."

"If it really doesn’t suit you, it’s no problem. We’ll figure something else out..."

After Mo Xiaolei’s job was settled, Wang Chuan changed the subject, reminding him, "Feifan, there are a lot of rumors online right now saying you’re going to run off to the United Kingdom to contribute your talents to foreigners."

Yan Feifan said casually, "Let them talk. They’re just a bunch of people who jump to conclusions and parrot whatever they hear."

"As long as I ignore them, it won’t affect me."

Yan Ziruo added with contempt, "The hospital website and its official video account both issued clarifications, stating that you just went there to perform a surgery. If they insist on deliberately spreading these misleading rumors, there’s nothing we can do."

After a pause, she asked teasingly, "Hey, Chuan, how are you adapting to being a regular doctor these last couple of days?"

Wang Chuan chuckled. "It’s not bad. At least I have a lot more free time every day."

"I’ve scheduled three surgeries for myself this week: two cosmetic and one pro bono."

"Busy but happy..."

Wang Chuan turned his gaze to Yan Feifan and said with a light laugh, "A lot of people are trying to use me as a back channel to persuade you to take on more students."

"Feifan, your four students are getting a lot of attention these days."

"Many people are speculating about who the other three are."

Yan Feifan chuckled. "Tomorrow, I’ll have the four of them make their official debut..."