Chapter 764: Internal Bleeding

Chapter 764: Chapter 764: Internal Bleeding

Li Xu was actually quite willing to come to the Emergency Department. He didn’t want to limit himself strictly to internal medicine or acupuncture. Aside from integrating the Oncology Department, the reason he had agreed to Dean Song’s offer to work part-time at the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine was that he genuinely wanted to learn and experience more sudden clinical situations. He was particularly eager to accumulate experience in modern surgical first aid.

In the Emergency Department, there were undoubtedly far more surgical patients brought in due to trauma, car accidents, and acute organ lesions. If he stayed in the internal medicine consultation room all the time, the probability of encountering such severe surgical and orthopedic patients would be very low.

After all, no matter how much theoretical knowledge the system’s intelligence provided, he still needed real flesh-and-blood patients to practice and verify it.

"Haha, that’s great." Hearing this, Zeng Yunjun burst into hearty laughter. "With Dean Li’s word, I won’t hold back. If we encounter any tricky emergencies in the department from now on, I’ll call you for backup anytime."

Li Xu smiled and nodded in agreement. Zeng Yunjun was in high spirits, feeling as though the Emergency Department had just gained a get-out-of-jail-free card.

WEE-OO, WEE-OO!

Just as the two were chatting happily, the ear-piercing wail of an approaching ambulance siren broke the brief tranquility.

Zeng Yunjun frowned, the smile instantly vanishing from his face. He complained in frustration, "What’s going on tonight? Did we poke an emergency hornet’s nest? This is incredibly bizarre."

Standing to the side, Lin Guorui subconsciously glanced at Li Xu. He opened his mouth, desperately wanting to tell Zeng Yunjun, "Old Zeng, haven’t you noticed the pattern yet? As long as Li Xu is in the Emergency Department, it’s like we’ve gained a hidden ’Patient Magnet’ buff. The probability of encountering complicated cases and sudden accidents absolutely skyrockets. We definitely won’t be short on patients!"

The ambulance slammed on its brakes and came to a steady halt at the entrance of the triage channel. Before the doors even fully opened, the accompanying doctor leaped out. Immediately after, a pale-faced young man stepped down, clutching his stomach. Accompanying him was a man in his early forties, his face full of anxiety and frustration.

"Another car accident?" Zeng Yunjun strode over.

The emergency resident responsible for receiving the vehicle had already finished the handover with the accompanying doctor. He quickly reported, "Director Zeng, a private car collided with a scooter going straight while turning at an intersection. From the scene, the collision speed wasn’t fast, and it doesn’t look like anything major. The patient can move his limbs freely and has no obvious external injuries. His stomach just hurts a little, so we brought him over for a comprehensive examination to rule anything out."

The young man clutching his stomach was the scooter rider. The middle-aged man was the unlucky private car driver.

After the collision, although the youth wasn’t bleeding, he lay on the ground clutching his stomach and refused to get up, constantly crying out in pain. The private car driver, afraid of encountering an insurance scammer but also worried about genuine internal injuries, could only quickly call the police and dial 120 to bring him to the hospital.

At this moment, even though the young man was being supported by the driver as he stepped out of the ambulance, he was still able to walk on his own. Aside from a little dust on his clothes, there truly didn’t seem to be anything seriously wrong with him.

Some of the more experienced doctors and nurses in the Emergency Department looked at the young man. Seeing how his eyes darted around despite him clutching his stomach, they secretly muttered in their hearts, "Is this kid trying to use this opportunity to extort a sum of money for medical bills and lost wages?"

However, Li Xu did not take the situation lightly like the others.

"Something’s wrong." Li Xu stared at the young man and whispered to Zeng Yunjun, "Director Zeng, look closely at the patient’s complexion and state."

Zeng Yunjun was, after all, a veteran emergency doctor with thirty years of experience and incredibly strong clinical intuition. Prompted by Li Xu, he immediately put away his dismissive attitude and carefully scrutinized the young man.

With just one glance, a layer of cold sweat instantly seeped out of Zeng Yunjun’s back. He, too, had spotted a fatal problem.

"Quick, bring a gurney over and have him lie down," Zeng Yunjun rapidly ordered. "Take him for an abdominal puncture immediately. At the same time, notify the Imaging Department to expedite an unenhanced whole-abdomen CT scan. Hurry, run!"

Following Zeng Yunjun’s urgent commands, the nurses immediately sprang into action with well-trained reflexes, even though they didn’t understand why. A gurney was quickly wheeled over. Before the young man could react, he was hastily supported—or rather, pressed—onto it by several doctors.

While pushing the gurney toward the resuscitation room, Zeng Yunjun reached out and pressed down on the young man’s upper left abdomen.

"Hiss—it hurts, go easy!" The young man gasped, unable to hold back a cry.

"Is it just a little painful, or is it severe? Does it hurt when I press down, or does it hurt more when I let go?" Zeng Yunjun asked loudly while quickly performing the palpation.

"A little... Ouch! It seems to hurt more when you let go..." Cold sweat began to bead on the young man’s forehead.

Following Zeng Yunjun’s examination, some of the young doctors pushing the gurney finally realized what was happening after observing the patient’s complexion. There was a high chance this young man was suffering from extremely perilous internal bleeding.

Generally speaking, if an organ ruptured and caused internal bleeding during a blunt impact like a car crash, there might not be a single drop of blood or even a bruise visible on the outside during the initial stages of the hemorrhage. Furthermore, due to the body’s traumatic stress and the compensatory response to blood loss, the patient’s early manifestations were often flushed skin, an accelerated heartbeat, and abnormal mental excitement.

Just like this young man—on the surface, he could still walk on his own and argue with the driver, seemingly no different from a normal person. This early stage of excitement could easily be misinterpreted by inexperienced doctors as emotional agitation caused by anger and arguing over the traffic accident. But in reality, once this abnormal ruddy complexion and mental excitement appeared, it meant the volume of blood loss in the patient’s body had reached a critical threshold, and their blood pressure was rising compensatorily.

Once the compensatory mechanism collapsed, the patient would instantly fall into a deep shock that not even an Immortal could save them from. This situation was known in the Emergency Department as the "invisible killer," and it was extremely dangerous.

"It’s definitely internal bleeding. Looking at the area of palpation and the signs of peritoneal irritation, it might be a ruptured spleen." Watching the patient being rushed away for an abdominal puncture and CT scan, Zeng Yunjun turned around and yelled at the nurse’s station, "Immediately arrange for nurses to establish two dual-channel intravenous lines! Prepare for rapid fluid resuscitation for volume expansion, and notify the blood bank to prepare blood. Bring up two bags of O-type blood for emergency use!"

"It is internal bleeding, and the left hypochondriac region has sustained trauma. The possibility of a subcapsular rupture of the spleen or parenchymal damage is extremely high," Li Xu stated with certainty, standing to the side.

Just moments ago, he had used visual inspection to spot the abnormal bright redness in the young man’s complexion and the floating light in his eyes. In traditional Chinese medicine, this was called the "outward floating of false yang," a precursor to a sudden collapse of qi and blood.