Chapter 186: [186] Department Shift Meeting
If this intelligence is true, the neurosurgery staff is not too crowded. Think about Dr. Jiang’s General Surgery Department One, which is an intense area of internal competition, with eleven attending physicians, eight associate professors, and an unsaid number of resident physicians.
As a top national hospital, ranked first, Guoxie has always had plenty of positions, but it still cannot accommodate too many doctors. It wasn’t until 2002 that the national unified medical professional title examination was established, and passing the exam didn’t guarantee a promotion; one had to wait for the hospital’s appointment.
For the hospital to appoint someone, the department’s approval, the hospital leadership’s consent, and the director’s decision were needed—three major hurdles.
Xie Wanying remembered what Senior Cao had said a couple of days ago: Being a doctor isn’t just about wanting to save lives and help the wounded.
Just thinking about saving lives and helping the wounded may not even qualify you to stay in this hospital to do so.
It isn’t that you shouldn’t save lives and help the wounded, but rather, it’s about the level of skill you have as a doctor to do so. Senior Cao’s words reflected a harsh and unforgiving reality.
Beyond the shoulder of Senior Brother Huang, she could see the handsome side profile of Senior Cao. Recalling his usual smiling face, his handsome features were now solemn to the point of meticulousness this morning.
Perhaps, she knew less than one percent about her senior brother. That’s right, she also didn’t know much about Senior Brother Huang. Looking at it now, Senior Brother Huang stood out among the many resident physicians in the same department and quickly became an attending physician—undoubtedly talented.
It wasn’t clear to her what the cardiovascular department she wanted to join would be like. She had heard that the neurosurgery department was supposedly the easiest to stay in, and yet it was . The pressure in Xie Wanying’s heart surged suddenly.
Images of the eldest senior sister struggling to secure a position at the affiliated hospital of her alma mater, agonizing every day to the point of losing hair, and yet not even a shadow of success was in sight, loomed in her mind. What would happen to her?
Looking back, she needed to ask Senior Brother Huang about the situation for the sake of the eldest senior sister.
“Shift change!” Director Lv shouted loudly.
The group fell silent.
Shift handover included the night shift nurses’ handover and the on-duty doctors’ handover. The so-called handover meant that the on-duty nurses and doctors briefed their colleagues on the general situation of the patients in the department since their colleagues generally went home after the day shift and were not clear about the patients’ conditions at night.
Today’s handover was particularly special because, due to the Spring Festival holiday, there had been no changes for six whole days. The nurses and doctors responsible for the morning handover had to work extra hard to explain clearly all the patients admitted and discharged over the past few days, including the deceased during that period.
Whenever there was mention of a deceased patient, everyone, whether directors, associate directors, or other doctors, would frown. The on-duty staff would describe the death cases in more detail.
Xie Wanying looked toward Doctor Wang, standing in front of everyone—it turned out that he was on duty for half the time this week.
Last night, there was one death. Considering the holiday period, it was fortunate that only one patient died.
Doctor Wang introduced the death case to the other colleagues: “The night before last, he was admitted to the department through the emergency room, a cerebral hemorrhage patient with a large amount of bleeding, who was persuaded to be admitted to our department. The patient’s family requested no surgery.”
“No surgery? How old is the patient?” Director Chen asked.
“Over seventy years old. In the meantime, it seems the patient’s family had called to consult someone outside our hospital—probably they learned that even after surgery, there was no guarantee of recovery.”
One very important characteristic of neurosurgery patients is that, even if the surgery is successful, some patients’ sequelae can be very severe.
Brain damage is irreversible. Not every family affected by it can take on the responsibility of care.