Chapter 869: [(869)] It is important to know which department to consult when seeking medical treatment Chapter 869: [(869)] It is important to know which department to consult when seeking medical treatment The cadres, down-to-earth as they were, had their own knack for persuading the masses. The village cadre responsible for propaganda raised a megaphone and began educating the crowd surrounding the car, “What are you doing? If you crowd around the car, it can’t move, and the doctors can’t get out to treat you.”
The villagers’ feet shuffled, moving aside while looking back at the doctors in the car with reluctance.
“Move faster!” Village Chief Li yelled urgently at the hesitant villagers, “What time is it now? They’ve come all the way from the city, losing so much time on the road. I’ve told you so many times before. If you don’t cooperate, they won’t have time to see to your medical needs. If the doctors can’t finish seeing patients before dark, and it’s your turn that’s missed, it’s your own fault.”
With that, everyone started running. Soon, the crowd surrounding the minibus dispersed.
Village Chief Li was impressive! The doctors inside the bus gave him a mental thumbs up.
This time, the minibus smoothly parked in the small courtyard next to the village committee building.
Shier Zhuang was not poor economically, being a large village with a high population that had started growing profitable fruits in recent years, leading to a decent average income. Nonetheless, for many rural people, the notion of going to a big city for medical care or getting an appointment with Guoxie was fanciful.
An outreach program from such a big hospital was naturally highly sought after, and Shier Zhuang had snagged this opportunity from countless other villages. The village committee took it very seriously indeed.
The village cadres organized manpower on site and used several ropes as separators for the queues, allowing the registered villagers to line up in their respective lanes.
“Don’t get in the wrong queue. Lane one is for seeing the orthopedic doctor. Lane two is for the gastroenterologist. Lane three is for the neurologist. Lane four is for the cardiothoracic surgeon. Lane five is for the hepatobiliary surgeon. Lane six is for the pediatric surgeon,” the propaganda cadre read from the paper provided by Guoxie through the megaphone.
“What is neurology?” a villager asked.
Neurology? The cadre, who only knew how to read the paper, also didn’t understand and turned to look at the doctors.
“Is that for psychiatric conditions?” the villagers started discussing among themselves.
“Neurology is ,” Doctor Kim got off the bus and took the initiative to explain his specialty to the villagers, “It mainly deals with patients with cerebral vascular diseases. It’s non-surgical, conservatively managed through medication or other methods. It’s also appropriate for continuing treatment after an operation if surgery hasn’t resolved the issue.”
“My elder had a stroke diagnosed in the county hospital last time, can he be seen?” a middle-aged woman in the crowd asked.
“Yes,” Doctor Kim replied with a smile.
Immediately, a group of people looking for medical attention rushed into lane three where Doctor Kim was stationed. Suddenly, people were pushing and shoving, and some villagers even started arguing. Village cadres struggled to manage the crowd, using both verbal instructions and physical intervention.
The doctors and nurses gradually got off the bus. As the boxes of medical supplies were being unloaded, the doctors helped carry them, with the driver joining in to assist.
“You ladies might want to stand aside,” Chang Jiawei, considering himself a gentleman, said to the female doctors. But then, he turned his head and saw Xie Wanying already running with a box toward the village committee office: the sight nearly stunned him.
All the medical supplies and items were stored in the village committee office under the watch of a designated person to prevent the medically uninformed villagers from tampering with them.