Path of Medicine With a System

There were very few patients in the infectious diseases department. Plus, it was almost New Year’s. There were actually more doctors and nurses than patients. This would actually be a good thing. It would be for the best if things continued this way. Things would be even better if all hospitals no longer had any patients rather than being filled to the brim! This wasn’t about business! This author hopes that nobody in the world has to be sick, and that all medicine only needs to gather dust.

At the end of the morning patient checkups, all the other infectious diseases doctors went home after dealing with their patients since they weren’t on duty for today. Zhang Fan was scheduled for a 24-hour work shift today. Luckily, the infectious diseases department wouldn’t have any emergency surgeries to deal with. So, it wasn’t a big deal for only a single doctor to be on duty.

Right after Zhang Fan finished the afternoon checkups on the few patients in the department, a strange combination of people arrived in the department. A rather handsome young man came into the department, followed by three young women who were pulling on each other. None of them appeared to be very old. They all looked to be in the 18-20 age range.

The young man had a nice appearance. He had a cool hairstyle, white skin, slightly slender eyes, and a high nose bridge. However, he did seem to be slightly lacking in energy, and he mostly ignored the three women behind him.

The three young women behind him all appeared to be around the same age as well. However, they were wearing really heavy makeup that covered up their youthfulness. They had dark circles drawn with makeup around their eyes. Those who didn’t realize it was makeup would likely misunderstand that they had been hit by someone. They also had really bright red lipstick and colorful dyed hair.

“Doctor, I’m here for hospitalization!” The young man had a pleasant voice. Zhang Fan was currently typing the patients’ medical reports on a computer. He raised his head, and asked, “What’s the matter? Let me look at your hospitalization paperwork.”

Zhang Fan had originally been under the impression that only the young man needed to be hospitalized. Zhang Fan was then about to ask the three young women to leave since this was the infectious diseases department, after all. However, it turned out that all four of them needed to be hospitalized for the exact same reason: hepatitis B!

At a city hospital’s infectious diseases department, they would mostly only receive viral hepatitis patients. Patients with tuberculosis, typhoid, dysentery, and so on would usually be transferred to an infectious diseases hospital. After Zhang Fan looked over the patients’ medical information, he asked a nurse to arrange patient rooms for the four patients.

As for hepatitis B, maybe many people would think that it wasn’t really much of an infectious disease. Actually, this disease was truly troublesome. Most of the cases of cirrhosis early on in China had all been due to hepatitis transforming into cirrhosis. The next stage after cirrhosis would be liver cancer. That would be fatal! Meanwhile, in the western part of the world, cirrhosis was more commonly caused by alcoholism.

As for hepatitis B, it was actually different from hepatitis A. This disease was rather troublesome. First, it would be necessary to explain the liver’s functions. The liver would mostly transform nutrition into a substance that the body was capable of absorbing, along with providing detoxification and bile secretion. All of the protein in the blood was created by the liver. If your liver was in poor condition, then your body would start losing weight and your appetite would be lacking. A more severe consequence would be bleeding!

How to describe hepatitis B? To explain simply, there were two main types: one which was strongly infectious, and one which was slightly less infectious. How could hepatitis B spread to another? That would be by blood and body fluids. Those would make excellent carriers for the hepatitis B virus, which was capable of surviving for a very long period of time in the blood serum!

When Zhang Fan checked the patients’ medical information, “Oh my, it’s HBsAg+, HBeAg+, anti-HBc+, the most infectious type of hepatitis B.” After seeing this, Zhang Fan told the nurses, “All four patients have the most infectious type of hepatitis B. Be careful and protect yourselves!”

“Yes!” all the nurses in the department responded. Zhang Fan brought pen and paper with him to the patient room to ask the young man about his condition. In other departments, usually the patient would be summoned over to the doctor’s office to tell the doctor about their condition. However, that wouldn’t do in the infectious diseases department. The doctor would have to visit the patient’s room instead.

“What reason made you come get a checkup for hospitalization this time?” Zhang Fan asked the young man.

“Hmm, I kept feeling tired and lacking appetite. I also kept getting fevers. My girlfriends all have the same symptoms. My friend told me that my symptoms sounded like AIDS. He told me that in the worst-case scenario, my entire body would rot and I would die. That sounded too scary, so I hurriedly came here for a checkup. The doctor who diagnosed me told me that this isn’t AIDS, but I searched on baidu and found that this hepatitis B thing is similar to AIDS. Doctor, tell me, is this hepatitis B AIDS or not?”

“It’s not AIDS. How long have you been having your symptoms for?”

“About half a year. Doctor, if this isn’t AIDS, then can I not hospitalize myself then?”

“Oh! So you were scared by AIDS into coming here to get checked,” Zhang Fan said through his heavy facial mask. “Although hepatitis B isn’t AIDS, it’s equally fatal if it’s allowed to develop unchecked. What’s your current job? How old are you? Do you have any family history of illnesses?”

“I’m a freelancer. I’m 21 years old. My family members are quite healthy.” When the young man heard that it wasn’t AIDS, it was as if he came alive. He became far more energetic, and he started speaking rather glibly.

“You should lie down. I’ll give you a physical examination. Pull up your shirt.”

When the young man pulled up his shirt, Zhang Fan’s first impression was that he was really skinny. Zhang Fan could see his ribs quite clearly. The young man had a Buddha tattooed on his stomach. The Buddha’s mouth was on the bellybutton! When his belly was bulging, the Buddha would appear to be smiling. If he tucked in his stomach, the Buddha would appear unhappy. It really was a miraculous tattoo! Since the patient had a tattoo, Zhang Fan took a closer look. The patient’s stomach was filled with spider angiomas. Zhang Fan could only inwardly sigh and shake his head. The patient’s ignorance was truly scary! With a light touch, Zhang Fan could tell that the patient’s liver was really swollen. Zhang Fan checked the patient’s eyes and found icteric sclera.

“You should rest here and hospitalize yourself. Your disease is already in very severe condition.” Zhang Fan’s voice lowered significantly. The patient’s liver was so severely swollen despite his young age!

“Doctor, can you also have my girlfriends stay in the same patient room as me? We can even take care of each other this way!” The young man didn’t even realize that he already had half a foot in the grave. He was asking Zhang Fan a really naïve question.

“No. This is a hospital! You should properly focus on recuperating!”

Zhang Fan then left the young man’s patient room so that he could check up on the other three female patients who had come together with him.

When Zhang Fan opened the door to the next patient room, his eyes almost popped out in surprise. The nurse had arranged for two of the women to share a patient room, and gave the third woman a patient room to herself. Since all three of the female patients had the same hepatitis B strain, the nurse didn’t think that this would matter.

However, when Zhang Fan opened the door to the patient room, he saw that the two women were currently fighting! They were grabbing onto each other’s hair and ripping each other’s clothes! The were locked in battle when Zhang Fan entered!

The patients hadn’t received their hospital gowns yet. Both young women were very similarly dressed. They both had dyed hair, dark circles drawn with makeup around their eyes, white and black long knee socks, and extra thick sponge shoes. Both of them continued to fight each other after Zhang Fan came in. They had ripped each other’s clothes so much that both were revealing their black underwear!

“Let go of each other immediately! Otherwise, I’m going to call the police!” Zhang Fan told them while also shouting for a nurse. He was a man, after all. If he went in the patient room right now without a nurse present, it would be difficult for him to explain things afterwards. After two years of work, Zhang Fan had learned how to protect himself! He knew that it would be best for him to avoid getting involved in unnecessary trouble.

The nurse also immediately became worried when she arrived and saw the situation. “Let go of each other, do you hear me!” This nurse was pudgy and middle-aged. She had a sharp voice and severe tone.

The two young women finally reacted to the nurse. When Zhang Fan had shouted at them, both had ignored him.

“Make her let go first!”

“You let go first!”

“Both of you let go together! I’m going to count 1, 2, 3. Do you hear me!? Otherwise, I’m calling the police!” The pudgy nurse grabbed both young women and pulled them apart.

Both young women simultaneously let go of each other.

“B*tch!”

“You’re the b*tch!”

What exactly was happening here? It turned out that none of these young people were from the border province. They were a host and three hostesses working at a certain karaoke bar. The relationship between them was rather complex. The young man was a bit of a playboy. All three young women were simultaneously his girlfriends.

They would keep getting together and breaking up with each other repeatedly. Their relationships were unsteady. Maybe it was because they were still young, or maybe it was due to the nature of their job. Anyways, the young man would go out with this woman today, and with another woman on the next day. All four of them had rather unique views on love. Since the young man had a slightly feminine appearance and was rather beautiful, he could be described as either handsome or having a feminine beauty. Maybe that was why the three young women were simultaneously competing for him. Today, one of the young women would be the victor, and tomorrow, another young woman would be the victor. That was what was going on.

Recently, the four of them all started showing the same symptoms, which were later identified to be hepatitis B. The young man had been the first to show the symptoms. His symptoms were also the most severe. One of his friends who had at least some knowledge of sexually transmitted diseases had convinced him to come get checked at the hospital. His three girlfriends also decided to get checked together with him.

The three women originally had a stable romantic triangle relationship. The nurse hadn’t expected that separating the three would immediately lead to a fight.

“Are you going to properly stay at the hospital or not? If not, then leave! I’ll give you all one last chance. If I see you fighting with each other again, I’ll immediately kick you out of the hospital.” The oldest nurse in the infectious diseases department pretended to be really strict with them. These four patients were all adults. They should be taking responsibility for their own actions. The nurse was worried that they would injure each other while fighting at the hospital.

In the end, the only solution was to give all three young women private patient rooms of their own. Luckily, the infectious diseases department had many empty patient rooms.

No matter what the patients were like, Zhang Fan would still properly perform his work of asking about their condition and giving them physical checkups. He checked all three young women individually, with a female nurse to assist him.

The three young women had all sorts of confusing markings on their bodies. These three young women really could be described as being highly unique. After two years of working, Zhang Fan finally felt like he had witnessed what youthful confusion was.

The three young women had all sorts of cigarette burn marks, tattoos, letterings, and cut wounds on their bodies. It was as if their bodies were broken wooden boards rather than belonging to themselves. Zhang Fan was repulsed, as well as feeling pity for the three young women!

The checkups’ results weren’t very good for the patients, especially for the young man. His organs were already beginning to fail. He had led an extremely wild lifestyle due to his youth, but he hadn’t expected that his body was already half broken on the inside. His body would collapse on him soon!

The young man indulged in a large amount of casual sex, he drank lots of alcohol, and he slept during the day and was active at night. Judging by his mentality and how he was easily excitable, Zhang Fan felt that it was likely that he also dabbled in an illegal drug such as marijuana or ecstasy.

“You should have the four patients get more detailed checkups. The young man’s condition is especially bad. All of you need to be especially careful and pay close attention to these patients,” Zhang Fan especially told the nurses.

He asked the four youngsters about their family members. For all four, they either had no family or their family members were in inland China. Was it due to society or because of themselves that they didn’t value their bodies at all? Zhang Fan didn’t know. He didn’t understand!

Things were so bad for the young man’s health that he basically had no future at all left to him. In the future, the young man wouldn’t even be able to guarantee basic health anymore. Zhang Fan could only shake his head in pity as he wrote the medical reports and ordered more detailed checkups for the patients.