Chapter 38 Something's Happened!

Evan and Oliver have overslept. A visit to a county hospital may offer the chance of a lifetime—if they can get there in time.

Oliver Liu pulled Evan Xu outside at a run. They had stayed up far too late the night before and somehow managed to oversleep.

Oliver was beside himself, dragging Evan along at a pounding run.

Evan stared in confusion at the unfamiliar surroundings as they ran. “Where are we?”

“Still half asleep? This is the People's Hospital in one of the outlying counties!” Oliver didn't look back.

Evan was startled. Had the script changed?

“How did we get here?”

“You really are half asleep! We're here on a three-day support visit to a local hospital. Have you forgotten already?” Oliver shouted as they ran.^[1]

“Oh!” Now Evan understood what they were doing.

But something still didn't make sense. “What's that got to do with Dr. Qian taking a disciple?”

Oliver hauled him along without turning his head. “Didn't I tell you last night? How could you forget so fast? Everyone at the hospital's been saying Dr. Qian wants to take one more disciple before he retires. Whoever does best on this visit has a very good chance!

“Didn't you notice? The young doctors they picked are some of the best in our Chinese medicine gynecology department. Come on! If we let Dr. Yan or Dr. Zhao beat us to this, we'll never forgive ourselves!”

After all that running, they reached the courtyard. A banner welcomed the visiting experts who had come to help the local hospital.

They ran on into the hospital.

A crowd had gathered outside the consultation room.

The county hospital had its own Chinese medicine department. Director Liu wanted its young doctors to take this chance to learn from the visiting specialists. Quite a few experts had come from Xiyuan Hospital.

They had agreed to have the young doctors assess the same patient and write down their diagnostic and treatment recommendations. Dr. Qian and the other experts would then teach them through the case.

This had all been explained the night before. Yet these two idiots had still managed to oversleep!

The county hospital's young doctors had finished their assessments, as had the other two young doctors from Xiyuan. Only Evan and Oliver were left.

By the time they reached the consultation room, they felt as though they might cough up blood.

“Oliver Liu… Evan Xu… reporting for duty!” Oliver bawled from a distance.

Dr. Thomas He, Oliver's clinical mentor, had been waiting anxiously at the door. The two bastards had finally arrived. “Hurry up! You're the only ones we're waiting for!”

“Aaaah…” Oliver dragged Evan through the door, pulling so hard that Evan's arm hurt.

Everyone turned to look at them as they rushed into the consultation room.

The pair bent over with their hands on their knees, gasping too hard to get a complete sentence out.

They were exhausted.

Dr. Qian could only stare. What on earth were these two doing?

Director Liu looked amused. These young men!

Evan looked up. Everyone was watching them, and no one was examining the patient. Were they really the only two left?

Then he looked at Dr. Qian. At the sight of that familiar face, emotion rose in him. He was finally back.

Dr. Qian gave a small shake of his head. “Director Liu, shall we take a ten-minute break?”

“Of course, of course. This way, Dr. Qian.” The director was exceptionally courteous to him.

Evan and Oliver were mortified.

Dr. Qian glanced at them and snorted. “Go and wash your faces! Look at the state of you!”

“Yes, sir. Right away…”

They went to the nearby restroom, washed their hands, then their faces. At last they caught their breath and began to settle down.

Evan could finally think clearly. Why hadn't this visit picked up smoothly where the last one ended? And why was Dr. Qian suddenly taking a disciple?

“Oliver, why's Dr. Qian suddenly decided to take a disciple?”

Oliver lowered his voice. “He's getting very old. He probably won't be able to practice for many more years, so he wants one last disciple while he still can. His final disciple!”

Evan felt a surge of excitement, then frowned. “Only one?”

“Yes.”

Evan stared at him. That meant only one of them could become Dr. Qian's disciple. In the life Evan remembered, Oliver had become Dr. Qian's final disciple.

Oliver gave him an easy slap on the shoulder. “Don't worry. We're practically brothers, aren't we? Whoever becomes his disciple, the other can become that one's disciple. Surely no one could object to a grand-disciple learning along with them.”

“Then you can be the grandson,” Evan said irritably.^[2]

“Get lost!” Oliver shot back. Then he waved him on. “Come on. Let's go in.”

They hurried back inside.

Dr. Qian glanced at them. “Here's the patient. Examine her, then write down your diagnosis and prescription. This is an assessment. Let's see what you can do.”

Oliver went first. Chinese medicine had four diagnostic methods: inspection, listening and smelling, questioning, and palpation. After his assessment, he came back and carefully wrote in the medical record.^[3]

Evan frowned slightly. Oliver looked remarkably capable. Before Evan had returned to the present last time, their skills had been about equal. Why did Oliver seem better now?

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Evan felt enormous pressure.

Dr. Qian was reading Oliver's recommendations. “Evan, your turn.”

“Yes, sir.” Evan stepped forward to examine the patient.

He worked carefully through each part of the assessment, considering all four diagnostic methods together and neglecting none.

Medical skill was never for showing off. A doctor had to be thorough and attentive. Considering all four methods together was meant to reduce mistakes and missed diagnoses.

When he had finished, Evan wrote his diagnosis in a notebook and handed it to Dr. Qian.

Dr. Qian read his diagnostic and treatment recommendations without saying anything.

The woman was losing patience. She had been there for ages. “Well, what is actually wrong with me? I've been wondering all this time,” she asked anxiously.

“Abdominal masses and accumulations,” Dr. Qian replied absently, still reading Evan's notes.^[4]

A few of the young doctors let out an “Ah,” their faces falling.

Director Liu gave them an annoyed glare.

Evan and Oliver quietly exchanged a glance.

Dr. Qian looked up at those hopeless young doctors and continued. “A fixed mass, caused by yin deficiency and blood heat. The disorder is in the blood aspect. Yin deficiency allows yang to predominate. Heat accumulates in the blood aspect, causing the blood to flow recklessly.^[5]

“Heat and fire causing a red face, headaches and dizziness, blurred vision and ringing in the ears, irritability and insomnia. Heavy menstrual bleeding, dark in color. A thin yellow tongue coating, a red tongue with prickles, and a thready, wiry pulse…”^[6]

Before he could finish, the woman interrupted.

After all this delay, she was thoroughly irritated. “No, no, doctor. What kind of mass? What's wrong with me?”

“What Western medicine calls uterine fibroids. But you'd better have an ultrasound afterward to see how big they are.”^[7]

Dr. Qian returned to Evan's treatment plan. Besides a modified Sanjia Jian prescription, Evan had included acupuncture treatment. That caught his interest.^[8]

“What? I've got uterine fibroids?” The woman suddenly became agitated.

She startled Dr. Qian before he could finish reading. He looked up.

The woman picked up her bag impatiently. “So it's just fibroids! After taking up all that time. I'm leaving.”

“Comrade, aren't you going to have treatment?” Dr. Qian asked, puzzled.^[9]

She rose to leave. “Of course I am! But I've got fibroids. I need a Western doctor to operate.”

“Comrade, we can treat them too,” Oliver put in.

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, please. Don't make fun of me. Do you think I'm one of those uneducated villagers? Isn't Chinese medicine for building up your health and treating period pain? This needs surgery. You can't treat it. You won't fool me!”

Everyone in the room was speechless.

She waved a hand, muttering, “Now I'll have to get examined again by a Western doctor and pay all over again. What a waste of my time. Well, goodbye, everyone!”

She was about to go out when someone suddenly rushed through the doorway, almost colliding with her.

“Hey! Watch what you're doing!” she exclaimed in fright.

The newcomer had no time for her.

“Director! There's trouble! Something's happened!”

Reader Notes

1. ↩︎ A hospital support visit. Larger hospitals have sent clinicians to smaller hospitals to provide care and help train local staff. This passage describes a short visit of that kind: Xiyuan's specialists are also teaching through a shared case. A historical account records rural medical teams working in 1979–1980, although it concerns another hospital and region. It supplies background for the arrangement, rather than documentation of this fictional three-day visit. Source: Hubei Health Commission — A medical partnership across half a century, historical section (in Chinese).
2. ↩︎ The final disciple and the “grandson.” A physician's disciple belongs to a teaching lineage, learning clinical judgment and methods through a personal teacher–student relationship. A “final disciple” is the last student the teacher accepts. A disciple's own disciple is one teaching generation further down: here, “grand-disciple.” Chinese uses a character meaning “grandchild” in that term, which lets Evan turn Oliver's generous offer into a joke about being the grandson. The relationship is educational, not biological. Source for clinical mentorship: National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine — Mentorship education measures, articles 3 and 6 (in Chinese).
3. ↩︎ Considering all four methods together. The four methods are observation; attending to sounds and smells; asking about symptoms and history; and examination by touch, including the pulse. Tongue findings belong to observation. Bringing the findings together is what “considering all four” means here. The novel stresses a careful assessment, but does not describe each individual maneuver or tell us what every young doctor wrote. The translation leaves those details unstated. Source: Hong Kong Polytechnic University — Four Diagnostic Methods.
4. ↩︎ Abdominal masses and accumulations. Zhengjia and jiju are traditional categories covering abdominal masses and related presentations. A zheng or ji mass is described as fixed, whereas jia or ju refers to a more mobile or less tangible presentation. These categories do not identify one modern disease by themselves. At this point Dr. Qian is giving a traditional diagnostic category, rather than reporting the result of an imaging examination. Source: WHO — Chinese medicine terminology, entries 2162–2164, printed pp. 307–308.
5. ↩︎ Yin deficiency, blood heat, and the blood aspect. In this traditional explanation, insufficient nourishing and cooling yin allows yang activity to predominate. “Blood heat” and blood “flowing recklessly” describe a pattern in which heat is said to disturb blood and produce bleeding. “Blood aspect” locates Dr. Qian's explanation within that diagnostic vocabulary; it is not a blood-test result or a statement that the patient has a bloodstream infection. His causal account is retained as his own assessment, without changing it to a different pattern. Source: WHO — Chinese medicine terminology, entries 401, 430, and 436, printed pp. 34, 37–38.
6. ↩︎ Tongue and pulse findings. The tongue body and its surface coating are described separately: here the body is red with small raised projections, while the coating is thin and yellow. “Thready” describes a fine, narrow pulse under the fingers; “wiry” describes a tense, stringlike quality. They are tactile qualities, rather than numerical heart-rate readings. These are the findings Dr. Qian lists in his explanation; the passage does not provide an instrumental measurement. Source: WHO — Chinese medicine terminology, entries 657, 673–674, 696, 896, and 904, printed pp. 62–63, 66, 89–90.
7. ↩︎ Fibroids and ultrasound. Uterine fibroids are noncancerous growths in or around the uterus. Ultrasound uses sound waves to form images; it can show the number, location, and size of fibroids. The Chinese term B-chao refers to an ultrasound scan, so it is rendered directly here. Dr. Qian names the condition before the scan has taken place. The woman's assumption that it necessarily requires surgery is her own; modern treatment options vary with symptoms and other findings. Source: NHS — Fibroids, diagnosis and treatment.
8. ↩︎ The written prescription. Sanjia Jian is kept as the formula name given in the Chinese text. “Modified” translates jia-jian, adjusting a formula's ingredients or amounts. A classical text lists a prescription with this name, but the novel supplies no ingredients or doses here, so the exact version cannot be established from this passage. Evan has also written an acupuncture plan. Neither that treatment nor the herbal prescription has been carried out at this point. Source for the name: Yifang Jiedu — “Sanjia Jian,” classical text transcription (in Chinese).
9. ↩︎ “Comrade.” Tongzhi was a common respectful way of addressing another person in the period of this scene, and it could be used for a woman as well as a man. Its use here does not establish the patient's political affiliation or a personal relationship with the doctors. Keeping the slightly formal English “Comrade” preserves the historical register already established in Evan's earlier visits to the past. Source: Laishan District Government — Customs of address, “Etiquette and Customs” (in Chinese).