Chapter 24

Tang Feiwan was awakened by Lin Ye’s icy voice. Her throat moved with difficulty, completely snapping out of her daze. Like a puppy that had done something wrong, she hung her head and apologized: “I’m sorry.”

Lin Ye ignored her, reached out to unscrew the bottle of saline solution, and motioned for Tang Feiwan to stretch out her leg.

There was a plastic basin under her knee. Lin Ye leaned over slightly, tilted the bottle, and poured saline solution onto the gauze. The saline solution could soften the gauze, so that when she removed it later, it wouldn’t stick to the wound. After pouring half a bottle of saline solution, Tang Feiwan watched her movements with a slight frown. Although Lin Ye had tried to be as slow as possible, it still hurt so much that she gasped and even cried out.

The wound was deep, although it didn’t need stitches, the doctor on duty still suggested rinsing it with hydrogen peroxide first, then washing away the hydrogen peroxide with saline solution, and finally disinfecting it with iodine. Tang Feiwan couldn’t imagine how she had managed to hold back from crying out in pain last night when she rinsed it with hydrogen peroxide.

“Does it hurt? I’ll be gentler.” Lin Ye used saline solution to clean the wound and said softly.

“Hmm.” Tang Feiwan listened to her long-lost gentle voice, her heart itched slightly, and she allowed herself to cry out in pain.

“Ouch, it hurts, Director Lin.”

Lin Ye coaxed her while softening her movements. In the end, when she disinfected it with iodine, Lin Ye suspected that she was doing it on purpose and asked: “Doctor Tang, why didn’t you cry out in pain last night?”

Tang Feiwan argued: “There were so many colleagues coming and going outside last night, I was embarrassed.”

Lin Ye looked at the tears in the corners of her eyes and believed her. She buried her head in cleaning up the remaining medicine and gauze on the coffee table, her voice so low that it was almost inaudible: “Did someone help you rub medicine on your back injury?”

“Hmm, I asked a Chinese medicine practitioner from the back door clinic to help me.” Tang Feiwan knew that she couldn’t let Lin Ye help for now. First, she was afraid that she wouldn’t be willing and that it would be awkward if she was forced to do it. Second, she was really embarrassed. Last night, just lifting her clothes to check the injury had made her blush and her heart race.

“Okay.” Lin Ye continued to work with her hands, but her ears gradually turned red, more obvious than before when she was outside.

Tang Feiwan had learned her lesson and didn’t dare to look at her directly anymore. Instead, her sneaking glances caught this scene. Why was she blushing? Did she want to?

Tang Feiwan was still pondering this when Lin Ye stood up and said goodbye: “Doctor Tang, get some rest, I won’t bother you anymore.”

“Thank you for tonight.” Tang Feiwan saw her off to the door.

“You don’t need to thank me, colleagues should care about each other.” Lin Ye deliberately emphasized the word colleague. After she left, Tang Feiwan didn’t feel uncomfortable, but instead, she was more convinced that the other party still cared about her because of their half-hour interaction.

But she still needed to interact more, to let Lin Ye know that she cared about her too…

The next day, Tang Feiwan went back to the hospital to work. The wounds on her back and knee still affected her work, so she could only do what she could in the office and the wards. It wasn’t until the fifth day after her injury that she participated in a rescue operation.

That day, she and Lin Ye were on the day shift. While making rounds, she heard Lin Ye ask Gu Yan a question in the next bed: “Gu Yan, tell me, what are the different types of abdominal pain?”

“Intermittent…”

“No, think again, it’s divided into pathological and physiological.” Lin Ye frowned and reminded her.

Gu Yan suddenly realized: “Visceral pain.”

Tang Feiwan finished checking the bed next door, walked past her, and said casually: “Gu Yan, you just mix up all your theoretical knowledge. When you’re asked to pick it out right away, you’ll be caught off guard.” After she finished speaking, she walked to another bed.

Lin Ye took the opportunity to ask: “What are the characteristics of visceral pain?”

“The pain is not accurately localized.”

Lin Ye looked through Gu Yan’s glasses at her unconfident expression, nodded in affirmation first, and then asked: “Anything else?”

“The pain is not clear, it can be distension pain, it can be cramping pain.”

Lin Ye and Gu Yan asked and answered, which was obviously easier than Tang Feiwan directly letting her practice opening multiple intravenous pathways. But that night, Tang Feiwan sent her a WeChat message explaining: “Gu Yan, I started out doing clinical work abroad, they just let you practice directly. So you can only practice constantly and repeatedly in private. In our country, with the same level of education, even girls from slightly better universities, hospitals are willing to choose boys. Since Director Lin gave you this opportunity to learn in the emergency critical care rescue team, if you want to do clinical work, you have to work hard. Read more medical records, observe other doctors more, think more, and practice more.”

So Gu Yan planned to learn from both sides. First, she was discouraged by Tang Feiwan, and then she went to Lin Ye’s side to eat a date to build up some confidence.

They finished their rounds and just returned to the office when the nurse called.

“Director Lin, a 31-year-old young female patient has just been sent in.”

“What’s the general situation?” Lin Ye was on the second shift today and motioned for Tang Feiwan to receive the patient.

The nurse replied: “She suddenly had difficulty breathing this morning, her blood pressure was 90/60, her heart rate was 124, her respiratory rate was 25, and her blood oxygen saturation was 95%.”

“Go now.” Tang Feiwan listened to Lin Ye’s words and quickened her pace.

In the resuscitation room, bed number three, the patient was already connected to a heart monitor. Tang Feiwan went forward to check, saw that her lips were cyanotic, but her consciousness was still relatively clear. Her forehead was covered in a fine sweat, and there was a clear indentation above her clavicle and sternum when she inhaled, a typical sign of hypoxia.

“What’s her temperature?” Tang Feiwan took out the stethoscope she kept in her white coat pocket and put it in the patient’s clothes to listen.

The nurse replied: “38.5°C.”

“Wet rales, take a chest X-ray first.” Tang Feiwan put away the stethoscope and asked, “Who accompanied the patient? Where is the family?”

The nurse said: “Outside, a girl, about the same age as the patient.”

“Okay, I’ll go out and ask.” Asking the patient’s family can help to understand the patient’s past medical history, which will help to find the reason for her difficulty breathing in time.

As Tang Feiwan was about to leave the resuscitation room, the nurse asked through the loudspeaker: “Is the family of Qian Xiaoli here?”

“Yes, I am.” The girl with a shoulder bag was already standing at the door of the resuscitation room. When she heard the announcement, she raised her hand and her head nervously looked inside.

“Are you Qian Xiaoli’s family?” Tang Feiwan asked routinely.

The girl nodded: “Yes, I am.”

“Did she have any previous illnesses? Like heart disease?”

The girl was taken aback: “I don’t think so, she hasn’t mentioned it, she’s always been healthy.”

“When did she start having trouble breathing?”

The girl recalled: “Last night. She started coughing the day before yesterday. We thought it was a common cold, so we went to the clinic to get medicine. She took it for two days, and then suddenly had difficulty breathing last night.”

Tang Feiwan frowned: “Why didn’t you come last night?” Regarding respiratory circulation, a slight oversight could lead to major problems.

The girl rattled off: “She’s a web novel author, she needs to update at night. I persuaded her to come to the hospital, but she insisted that she was about to finish the finale and wanted to finish writing as soon as possible so she could rest. But this morning, she felt worse, and she still hadn’t finished writing the novel.”

Web novel author, Tang Feiwan caught the key information and asked: “Does she sit in front of the computer for hours on end when she’s writing?”

“Yes, yes. Half a year ago, she had a venous thrombosis because of writing. She was treated for two or three months.”

Venous thrombosis, Tang Feiwan thought it was bad. The patient might have developed pulmonary embolism due to venous thrombosis. Pulmonary embolism, an extremely dangerous disease. The autopsy report of Dong Guo a few days ago came out, and they were right, it was acute pulmonary embolism.

“Okay, thank you.” Tang Feiwan didn’t ask any more questions and turned to walk back to the resuscitation room. She had to rule out pulmonary embolism first. Based on the patient’s current condition, it shouldn’t be severe. As long as it was diagnosed and treated immediately, it would be in time.

She lifted the curtain and instructed: “Quickly, don’t do the chest X-ray first, do a CTA of the pulmonary artery.”

Outside the resuscitation room, the girl with the form was about to pay when Tang Feiwan stopped her: “Hello, are you her roommate or relative? If we diagnose pulmonary embolism, this disease is quite critical, we need to let her immediate family know.”

The girl looked hesitant: “I…”

Tang Feiwan asked directly: “What’s the difficulty?”

“Doctor, I…” The girl stammered, still hesitant.

“You can say anything you want, we’ll keep it confidential.” Tang Feiwan sensed that she must have something she couldn’t say.

The girl tested Tang Feiwan’s reaction: “We’re… you know.”

“It’s okay, I understand what you mean. Can you contact her family?” Tang Feiwan was worried that the other party would be embarrassed and steered the conversation back to the main point.

“Xiaoli’s phone is with me, I can contact her mother, but her mother has cut off contact with her for more than four months.” The girl was Zhang Wan, Qian Xiaoli’s girlfriend, five years younger than her. She took out her phone from her bag and entered the password.

Probably like herself, her family didn’t accept it. Tang Feiwan felt the same way and sighed: “Okay, contact her as soon as possible.”

Zhang Wan didn’t expect Qian Xiaoli’s mother to answer the phone after two rings. She stood there, not knowing how to speak, but the mother on the other end of the phone spoke first: “Xiaoli?”

“Auntie, it’s Zhang Wan.” Qian Xiaoli’s mother knew Zhang Wan existed.

There was silence on the other end.

Zhang Wan mustered her courage and said: “Auntie, she’s in the hospital. The doctor said you need to come here personally.”

Qian Xiaoli’s mother spoke urgently: “The hospital? What’s wrong with Xiaoli?”

“We don’t know yet, the doctor is helping her to rule out some things.”

“Okay, which hospital? I’ll be right there.”

“The Second Affiliated Hospital.” As soon as Zhang Wan finished speaking, Qian Xiaoli’s mother hung up the phone immediately.

So, in the most critical moments, you can tell that the people who care about you the most still care about you.

Tang Feiwan returned to the office to work and waited for Qian Xiaoli’s results. Emergency examinations are fast, and after about an hour, the nurse got the report and called her. Zhang Wan, who was outside the resuscitation room, was also asking questions, saying that Qian Xiaoli’s mother had arrived at the hospital. Tang Feiwan took the report and went directly to them.

“Doctor, what’s the situation?” Qian Xiaoli’s mother looked anxious.

“Good news, we’ve ruled out the most critical pulmonary embolism.” Tang Feiwan flipped through the blood test results. “The white blood cell count, neutrophils, and other blood tests are normal, basically ruling out pneumonia.”

Qian Xiaoli’s mother asked: “Then what’s the reason?”

“The ECG and troponin are normal, so it doesn’t support a heart problem at the moment.” Tang Feiwan thought for a moment. “So, we need to continue observing. We’ll treat her symptomatically with medication for now.”

“Okay, doctor, do whatever tests you need to do.” Qian Xiaoli’s mother requested.

“Don’t worry, we’ll do our best.” Tang Feiwan was still pondering the report in her hand when the door to the resuscitation room suddenly opened and Qian Xiaoli’s attending nurse ran out. “Doctor Tang, the patient’s heart rate is 137, her blood oxygen saturation has dropped to 90%, and then, then…”

Tang Feiwan asked: “Then what?”

“I wanted to give her some water, but she vomited it all up.”