Chapter 737: Medical History

Helpless, Nurse Ma said, "So you need to cooperate with our treatment, ma'am. Uncle Guo has fully complied with all the doctors' treatment plans."

Hearing this, the difficult woman cried even harder, complaining between her sniffles and tears:

"Am I not cooperating enough? I take whatever Western medicine you tell me to take. I take whatever IV drips you prescribe. I do whatever tests you order. I've had my blood drawn so many times my arms are full of needle marks.

"And the result? Why are you treating me like this? You're deliberately refusing to treat me properly. From the very beginning, you assigned me to the traditional medicine side. I'm not a traditional medicine patient. You guys don't want to care for me at all..."

Nurse Ma was completely speechless. This woman was simply an expert at twisting logic. Just as she was about to retort, Lin Guorui, who was standing nearby, raised a hand to stop her.

As the department director, what kind of bizarre patients hadn't Lin Guorui seen? His imposing presence was not something a young nurse could match. He didn't argue over pointless details, instead asking in a deep voice, "Ma'am, let's put our cards on the table. What exactly do you want?"

The woman was stunned by his directness. After freezing for a few seconds, she started wiping her tears again, playing the victim. "What... what can I do? I'm just a helpless patient in your hospital, with no one to turn to and nowhere to go for help. What else can I possibly do?"

The other patients in the ward shook their heads, feeling that this woman was simply making too much of a fuss.

Lin Guorui watched her coldly for a moment before saying calmly, "If you don't have any other specific requests, we will just continue with the treatment plan we've laid out for you. Nurse Ma, go back to your work." With that, he made a show of turning to leave.

"Hey... wait!" The woman suddenly grew anxious and quickly called out to stop him.

Standing to the side, Nurse Ma also noticed something was off. She looked at the woman's anxious yet awkward demeanor, and then at Lin Guorui's knowing expression. It seemed Director Lin had already figured everything out.

Lin Guorui stopped, turned around, and waited for her to speak.

The woman felt deeply uncomfortable under his gaze, hesitating to speak. A trace of awkwardness surfaced through her previously shrewish expression. After stammering for a long while, she muttered softly, "Well... regardless... there must be a reason why so many people in this ward are recovering so quickly..."

Without a second thought, Nurse Ma blurted out, "What other reason could there be? They were all willing to accept an integrated approach of Western and traditional Chinese medicine. They drank the herbal medicine prescribed by Dean Li. You were the only one who refused, insisting that traditional medicine was a scam, and... wait..."

Halfway through her sentence, Nurse Ma suddenly realized what was happening. Good heavens! This woman—who had previously berated traditional Chinese medicine as utterly worthless and refused to let them treat her—was now seeing others getting discharged after drinking the herbal medicine while she herself was still suffering from a fever. She was preparing to switch her tune!

But she was too concerned about saving face to swallow her pride and proactively ask the doctors for help. That was why she was acting up here, hoping the staff would take the initiative to offer her the herbal medicine and give her a graceful way out.

Lin Guorui had noticed the signs early on, which was why he had remained so calm. "I understand. You've offended everyone in the ward, and now you can't swallow your pride. You want us to speak to Dean Li for you, right?"

"Um, I..." Her true intentions exposed, the difficult woman flushed with embarrassment.

Lin Guorui couldn't be bothered with her anymore. At a time when medical resources were extremely strained, he had no free time to coddle a giant baby's emotions. He raised his hand, cutting her off directly. "Alright, I'll go talk to Dean Li. Nurse Ma, let's go."

Lin Guorui turned and walked away. Nurse Ma stood dazed for a moment before snapping back to reality and hurriedly following him out.

Seeing the two of them leave, the woman finally breathed a sigh of relief and slumped back onto her pillow. Although she had thrown a tantrum and lost some face, she had finally gotten the matter sorted out. As long as she could be cured, pride wasn't worth a damn.

Uncle Guo and Xu Huimin glanced at the woman and shook their heads secretly, wondering why she had made things so hard for herself. If she had known it would come to this, why did she have to say such ugly things in the beginning?

Soft-hearted as she was, Xu Huimin asked kindly, "Ma'am, do you want to get up and practice the Eight Brocades with me? Working up a slight sweat really makes you feel quite comfortable."

The woman glanced at Xu Huimin. Though she felt jealous inside, her face remained full of reluctance as she muttered, "I'm not going to practice something that looks like witchcraft. It's so slow—what use could it possibly have?"

Uncle Guo and Xu Huimin exchanged a glance, ignored her, and went back to focusing on their practice. The difficult woman lay back down, pulled the blanket over her head, and stewed in frustration.

Meanwhile, in the doctor's office.

Lin Guorui went over and relayed the situation to Li Xu. After listening, Li Xu didn't get angry. He nodded calmly and said, "Alright, I understand. I'll go take a look at her in a bit."

In reality, the matter was very simple. If she wanted to take traditional medicine, she could have just said so herself, yet she insisted on putting on this farce. During the current flu epidemic, the workload for the doctors and nurses was enormous. Everyone was working around the clock, running themselves ragged. Who had the time to squabble with her? Furthermore, nobody had the leisure to mock her.

Everyone was so busy that they had to squeeze in time just to take a sip of water; there was absolutely no time to indulge such meaningless issues of pride. Moreover, she was ultimately lying in the inpatient ward of the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine; she was their patient. As doctors, it was impossible for them to truly wash their hands of her and helplessly watch her condition deteriorate.

Finally, this wasn't the first time Li Xu had encountered such a situation. There were all kinds of people in this world, and she was hardly the only shrewish person who would rather suffer than lose face. Let alone in his old clinic, right here in the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, they had run into similar situations several times. There were those whose conditions deteriorated until they ended up in the ICU, and there were those like this woman who changed their tune halfway through. If doctors obsessively argued over every single slight and demanded apologies from their patients, they would have died of anger a long time ago.

In a doctor's eyes, there were only diseases, not grudges. Therefore, Li Xu agreed.

Li Xu had already briefly reviewed this patient's medical records when she was first admitted. Now that she was going to be treated with traditional medicine, he pulled up her file on the computer system and read through it once more.

Female patient, forty-three years old.

Medical History: Underwent surgical resection and chemotherapy for ovarian cancer fourteen years ago. Regular postoperative follow-ups showed no signs of tumor recurrence to date.

Present Illness: Onset of fever without obvious triggers starting September 14, peaking at 39 degrees Celsius. Accompanied by full-body aches, extreme fatigue, and a mild cough with scanty, hard-to-expectorate sputum.

A chest CT scan performed at another hospital revealed multiple exudative lesions in both lungs, suggestive of viral pneumonia. Outpatient treatment at the previous hospital included oral Oseltamivir capsules, along with intravenous drips of Reduning and Ganciclovir injections for antiviral therapy. However, the results were highly unsatisfactory, and the high fever persisted.

The day prior to admission, a follow-up chest CT indicated significant progression of the pulmonary exudation (expanded lesion area, specifics unknown). She was subsequently admitted as an emergency case under the diagnosis of "severe viral pneumonia."