25 – Resident

Li Yun arrived exactly on time for the orientation. The majority of residents were already seated in the small meeting room. Deputy Chief Lim, a short petite woman with a sharp haircut, turned to look at Li Yun and waited until he took his seat in the far right corner of the room. He chose a seat where he could see most everyone facial profile.

Once everyone was seated, Chief Lim passed out the guidebooks with the hospital policy and played an introductory video. Li Yun ignored the video and watched tĺhe other residents instead. An Luchang, Lui Jing, and the other residents looked diligently at the premade video, which was explaining the proper protocol for emergencies. Yang Kang, a slightly handsome doctor, chatted the entire time with Mi Xuan, who ignored Yang Kang, but she didn’t seem to be too bothered by him.

As the credit rolled, Chief Lim turned off the video divided them into teams. The new residents all had different schedules and were divided into four teams of two residents. Li Yun and An Luchang, both from the same interview grouping, were in a team.

“All right everyone,” Chief Lim said in a commanding tone, giving away her background as a former military surgeon. “If you flip to the next page, you will find your schedule for the upcoming year. You will most likely be working in pairs. In the morning round, report to the Hall B conference room. We will start the round from there. After the round, half of you will attend basic technical courses and half of you will report to the general surgery department. This will alternate as A and B days. In the afternoon, you will be working in different departments based on the rotation schedule.”

“Remember to keep your pager on at all times. All residents in ACS will get paged when a patient comes in. This will give you the opportunity to see how emergency situations are dealt with. But also be alert, there may be situations where you will need to participate.”

Everyone was a bit excited because there was a good chance they could participate as the 2nd assistant.

The Acute Care Surgery Unit was new, with only Doctor Chao as the senior attending. Two other attendings, Doctor Zuo and Doctor Mei were recently hired after training under Chief Zhang's new program, and were capable of performing most basic surgeries. As a result, the majority of surgery was performed by the chiefs and Doctor Hao, with the new attending as 1st assistant. 2nd assistant could be any of the residents that showed up first.

In most situations, the patients or their families would sign the consent form if the attending surgeon was the chief surgeon. Picky patients would not allow any residents to touch them at all. However, in an urgent situation, the family was more likely to sign anything under pressure.

By the end of the first day, Li Yun felt that something was off. Aside from the chiefs and An Luchang, people had been looking at him with a bit of disdain and caution. He got the same judgmental feeling from Chief Zhang and Gao the first time he went to the interview.

Li Yun saw An Luchang pass by, heading toward the resident quarter.

“An Luchang, hold up for a moment,” Li Yun called out.

An Luchang paused for a moment, and looked at him with a blank face.

“Did you hear any rumors about me?” Li Yun asked.

An Luchang thought for a moment. He normally didn’t bother with gossip, but Yang Kang had been talking too loudly about something people orientation started.

“Ah, I think Yang Kang mentioned something about you being related to Chairman Dan,” An Luchang replied.

“Chairman Dan?” asked Li Yun trying to remember if he knew any chairman. “The chairman of the Qinbei Hospital?” Li Yun laughed. “How in the world did they come up with that?”

An Luchang stared back with a blank face, making it obvious he didn’t know. Li Yun walked around the corner to find Yang Kang talking to Mi Xuan.

“I have always thought doctors look a bit sickly, but this year resident looks good,” Yang Kang gossiped with Mi Xuan. “An Luchang is cute, but he’s a complete bore to talk to. It’s like talking to you. Oh, did you hear about Li Yun? I think….”

Yang Kang immediately hushed up as soon as he saw Li Yun quickly approaching them. Li Yun stared at Yang Kang's guilty face, and then rolled his eyes.

“What were you about to say about me?” Li Yun asked.

“Huh? What?” asked Yang Kang, blushing a bit and pretending that he didn’t hear anything.

“Doesn’t matter, but where did you hear the rumor that I am related to Chairman Dan?” asked Li Yun.

“I overheard the nurses talking about it,” said Yang Kang as he recalled his conversations with the nurses at their stations.

“The nurses?” asked Li Yun.

If the nurses were gossiping, then they must have heard it from upper management. Li Yun was sure he didn’t know Chairman Dan, but it was likely someone close to Chairman Dan knew him. It finally occurred to him that someone who knew Chairman Dan got him an interview at Qinbei Hospital.

“Oh, okay, thanks,” Li Yun left.

“Gee, he gave me a fright,” Yang Kang fanned himself. “It seems like the rumor isn’t true.”

“Why are you so nosy?” Mi Xuan returned to her reading materials.

Li Yun headed to the ER. He decided to ignore the rumors as it didn’t affect any of his plans. It didn’t matter how he got the job, the more important thing was to gain more action points.

Inside the ER, the working condition was a complete mess.

The department was run by Chief Luo who was already an elderly man, and the only reason why he was chief was because he was old, looked reliable, and no one else wanted the position. Attending Doctor Zhao and Chief Resident Han were usually in charge, but they didn’t want to be there. They were constantly stressed out and yelling at the other residents and nurses.

There was no doctor in the ER department that knew how to command the situation. With high turnover rates and poor working conditions, the doctors there lacked the motivation to perform well.

The situation forced Chief Gao to work in the ER after his usual schedule. As an acute care surgeon, Chief Gao was under the general surgery department. It wasn’t his role to supervise the ER. But if he was not in the emergency room, the entire department would be in panic mode.

Chief Gao was surprised to see Li Yun in the ER. During the first two weeks of residency, residents were not scheduled to do a rotation in the ER. The ER was too messy of a place to indoctrinate residents.

“Already eager to save people?” Chief Gao probed.

“Of course, it has been my intention since the beginning,” said Li Yun.

“Do you know what to do?”

“Not yet.”

Li Yun had been to the ER before as an intern, but it was too chaotic and few doctors knew the correct procedures. Learning from bad teachers was often worse than not learning anything at all. Rather than learning from them, Li Yun read textbooks or used Zuowang.

Even though accumulating over a thousand live surgeries gave Li Yun the confidence and experience of an attending surgeon, the experience would not help in the ER. Handling emergency cases, knowing what medicine to prescribe and how much dosage to prescribe could be understood from reading textbooks, but only experience would allow doctors to make adjustments according to each patient's need and situation. Unfortunately, these decisions were made on the spot, and it was not something Li Yun could find a live feed for.

Nevertheless, with his knowledge and experience, he had an easier time dealing with most emergency situations, unlike the other first year residents and even the ER doctors here. He could determine a patient’s illness, direct them to the appropriate department and even perform the basic treatment. The only thing he lacked was a good mentor and someone who could provide affirmation.

“So, are you planning to tail me?” asked Chief Gao.

“Chief Gao, have you considered wearing a webcam, and doing live streaming?” Li Yun asked. “Streamers are getting pretty popular, and I’m sure that with your charisma and experience, you will help out a lot of potential surgeons.”

Chief Gao thought An Luchang, Mi Xuan and Yang Kang were odd, but Li Yun was also a bit off sometimes.

“Ah, no...” Chief Gao was about to say something, but his pager beeped, putting him on edge.