Chapter 289: Episode 289: Additional Update 1 Chapter 289: Episode 289: Additional Update 1 The victim, who hadn’t undergone any examination at the other hospital, arrived in a state of shock. The severity of the car accident at the scene must have been horrendous.
No wonder the patient’s family were in such a panic, the doctor from the other hospital must have told them: it might be impossible to save him.
“Yan Fen, save your uncle, save your uncle—” Mother Ah Tao kept repeating this phrase over and over again, her body trembling violently like a scarecrow about to fall over in the wind.
Luo Yanfen wanted to move her legs, but her mother’s hands were gripping her tightly, not letting go, so she had no choice but to look forward urgently: “Dr. Xie, Yingying—”
“Yingying, what do we do?” Li Qi’an asked his classmate, mainly because there were no teachers around for him to ask.
“Dr. Xie.” The senior nurse was also looking at her from across the room.
Xie Wanying’s gaze was fixed on the heart rate curve on the monitor: beep, beep, beep, beep…
“Did you call the doctor upstairs?” The nurse turned to ask her colleague.
“I called them as soon as the patient arrived, told them he’s here.”
“Which departments have been notified?”
“General surgery, thoracic surgery, and neurosurgery, they’ve all been notified!”
“Why haven’t they arrived yet?” The nurse shouted in frustration.
The electrocardiogram on the monitor showed that the heart rhythm was still there, but looking at the patient, something was off. What was wrong? There seemed to be not much bleeding on the victim’s body, his clothes possessing only small patches of bloodstains. The problem was, the victim was entirely unconscious, unresponsive to calls, his complexion deathly pale, indicating a greater possibility of internal bleeding.
Internal bleeding is more difficult to deal with than external bleeding; with external bleeding, you can see where it’s coming from, and apply pressure to stop it. Internal bleeding can only be treated by opening the cavity in the operating room. In the emergency department, it seems there’s not much that can be done for internal bleeding, except for fluid replacement. Moreover, where the internal bleeding is, how much blood has been lost, and whether the victim can still be saved is all unknown.
Hearing the nurses’ anxious conversations, Li Qi’an felt like collapsing on the spot: if the patient couldn’t wait to be taken to the operating room, he was doomed. Right now, it seemed like there was nothing they could do, as if they were helpless.
“We have to wait for a surgeon to come down and determine where the bleeding is before deciding where to send him.”
“Where is the bleeding?”
“Get a doctor over here to check.”
“The duty surgeon from general surgery isn’t here.”
“What about internal medicine?”
“Doctor Kim was just here, but I don’t know where he went. The other one, I don’t know where they went, either.”
In their panic, everyone was in disorder. In the emergency department, everyone spoke with the speed of lightning, each person frenziedly worried that the patient might not last until a doctor arrived.
“Isn’t Dr. Xie here? Ask her!”
When Li Qi’an heard the nurses referring to his classmate like that, he was startled: hey, his classmate was just a clinical intern who had started a few days ago.
In this situation, it wouldn’t just be nurses, but anyone who would clutch at straws. It was a matter of grabbing anyone in a white coat first and figuring out what to do next.
Xie Wanying, after checking the carotid artery and jugular vein of the victim, and then the blood pressure, told the nurse: “Prepare quickly for a pericardiocentesis!”
Li Qi’an was surprised to hear her answer, thinking to himself how bold she was to make such a judgment: What? Pericardiocentesis, what’s wrong with the victim’s heart?
“What’s the condition?”
“There’s pericardial effusion, the heart might have ruptured,” said Xie Wanying.
Ah? Li Qi’an and the nurses and others around him gasped in shock.
“Go call thoracic surgery! Dr. Xie says the heart is ruptured—”
Hearing the nurses relaying his classmate’s diagnosis, Li Qi’an was so astonished he nearly dropped his jaw.