Chapter 210: The Matter of Anesthesia

Chapter 210: Chapter 210: The Matter of Anesthesia

Did she know medicine, or didn’t she?

The question was a real head-scratcher.

Logically, Ji Huan did know medicine. But what Xin Ziqi meant by "knowing" was clearly on another level.

"You could say I know a little," Ji Huan said, making a tiny gap with her thumb and forefinger. "Just scratching the surface."

Xin Ziqi shook his head. "I get the feeling you know more than just the basics."

Xin Ziqi had harbored this suspicion for some time now.

Back when Dabao was brought to the Medical Ethics Hall, his injured leg had already been simply splinted. While it seemed like a simple technique, it wasn’t something just anyone could do.

Moreover, her ability to develop a hand cream showed she was well-versed in pharmacology and the properties of medicinal herbs.

Combined with her diagnosis and treatment of the vagrant’s injuries, all these signs led to one basic conclusion: Ji Huan knew medicine.

"I just can’t figure out your specialty. What I understand even less is, if you know medicine, why don’t you practice it yourself?"

"Well..." Ji Huan scratched her forehead with her pinky. "Doctor Xin, as you know, there are many different kinds of doctors..."

Doctor Xin cut straight to the point. "But you’re clearly more familiar with trauma."

"Familiar, yes... but I really don’t know how to treat it."

Ji Huan sighed in resignation at Xin Ziqi’s relentless questioning.

It wasn’t that she was intentionally hiding anything; in truth, there wasn’t much to hide.

The fact was, she wasn’t a surgeon, but an anesthesiologist.

Being an anesthesiologist requires more than just knowing about anesthesia. The role demands a broad base of knowledge.

Back in school, she had to delve into all the core courses for both clinical medicine and anesthesiology, such as internal medicine, surgery, obstetrics and gynecology, and pediatrics, as well as anesthetic physiology, anesthetic pharmacology, clinical anesthesiology, and pain management.

Therefore, she was required to have knowledge of basic and clinical subjects like pathology, physiology, pharmacology, internal medicine, surgery, OB/GYN, pediatrics, and anesthesia.

After so many years, she had been forced to become a jack-of-all-trades, master of none—someone who knew a little about everything but wasn’t a deep expert in any one field.

It was just that explaining all of this would be rather troublesome.

Her current identity was that of a young farm girl from the countryside. For an ordinary family, even literacy was a struggle, so how could she have learned medicine? And who was her teacher?

Furthermore, she had already learned that the Great Zhou did not have a department of anesthesiology at this time.

While researching, she had specifically looked for it, but the term was virtually absent from all medical classics.

However, a rather obscure miscellaneous book did mention an anecdote.

It told of a bell doctor who, when operating on a critically ill patient, would often have them drink a certain kind of wine. Throughout the entire procedure, the patient would be as if drunk and asleep—dazed and groggy. They wouldn’t struggle, nor would they even let out a single groan.

This herbal anesthetic, mixed with strong wine, was likely the legendary Powder for Anesthesia.

However, this bell doctor didn’t seem to be Hua Tuo; the book had no record of his name.

But one would imagine the process was similar.

Historically, Hua Tuo, after countless trials and improvements, finally formulated the Powder for Anesthesia.

He used the Powder for Anesthesia to reduce a patient’s pain while performing surgery, setting broken ribs, and removing ulcerated spleens—all were well within his capabilities.

Under the medical conditions of the time, these were considered extremely major surgeries.

Before the appearance of the Powder for Anesthesia, such procedures were unthinkable. Patients had to rely on their bodies to endure the agony, and it was likely they would die from the pain alone.

It was just a pity that later, Hua Tuo put his life’s work to the torch, and the greatest invention of his life was thus lost to time.

This old bell doctor’s formula was likewise not passed down.

As the years went by, later medical scholars no longer believed that such a miraculous prescription could truly exist, and they came to see this anecdote as merely a curious tale.

After some thought, Ji Huan decided to tell him the truth.

Honesty was the necessary foundation for cooperation, and with Xin Ziqi’s intelligence, she wouldn’t be able to fool him anyway.

What’s more, treating the vagrant later on would be impossible without addressing this.

"Um... have you ever heard of a type of medicine that can put a patient to sleep so surgery can be performed without pain? You understand surgery, right? Setting bones, suturing wounds... those can all be called surgery..."

"You mean... the Powder for Anesthesia?"

Xin Ziqi had indeed heard the anecdote, and his attitude was clearly one of disbelief.

However, he didn’t immediately deny it or laugh at Ji Huan.

He was observing Ji Huan, trying to confirm she wasn’t joking.

Ji Huan let him observe her calmly.

After a long moment, Xin Ziqi seemed to find his voice again.

"I have never heard of any master in the Great Zhou who specializes in this..."

Even if there were, he couldn’t believe that such a master would appear in Yeyang, right beside him.

"Ah... well... it’s... it was all a matter of fate and coincidence..."

Ji Huan waved her hand, her expression suggesting she had her reasons and couldn’t say more.

So, Xin Ziqi felt it wasn’t right to press her further about her teacher.

’Perhaps she met some great expert? That kind of fateful encounter is something others can only envy. No wonder she’s being so secretive.’

Besides, he was more concerned with the matter itself than with her background.

He had a strange intuition, a gut feeling that what Ji Huan said was true.

The thought left him deeply unsettled.

Although the Xin family specialized in bones and sinews, their practice wasn’t actually that niche. As long as it was an external injury, they treated it.

Take ordinary bone-setting and tendon-mending, or even just cleaning a wound. Most people could barely endure the pain. They often ended up screaming and howling during the process.

As for what Ji Huan mentioned—cutting open the chest and abdomen—that was utterly unthinkable.

’If there really was such a medicine, one that could be given to a patient to render them unconscious and unfeeling, then...’

Ji Huan could see that he wanted to ask but hesitated out of apprehension, so she took the initiative. "Let me give you a general overview."

"This... this probably isn’t a good idea."

Xin Ziqi tried his best to suppress his surging curiosity.

’What doctor would be willing to teach their specialty so easily to others?’

’Especially when what Ji Huan was about to describe was an unprecedented and miraculous art.’

’And she would just tell me so casually?’

"There’s nothing wrong with it."

It wasn’t that Ji Huan didn’t understand the unwritten rules of various trades—passing skills down to sons but not daughters, to insiders but not outsiders.

But understanding them didn’t mean she had to follow them.

Other things were negotiable, but knowledge was different.

Knowledge held by a single person is forever stagnant. Only by spreading it can it fulfill its true purpose and benefit more people.

"The origin and development of anesthesia have always accompanied surgery. Or rather, it was born from humanity’s need to alleviate pain..."

Anesthesiology is an interdisciplinary field. Its scope is too broad, and it’s too complex to explain easily.

But anesthesia itself is much easier to talk about.

To put it simply, it’s the use of drugs or other methods to cause a reversible functional inhibition of the central and peripheral nervous systems.

The main characteristic of this inhibition is the loss of sensation, especially the sensation of pain.

But how to relay this to Xin Ziqi was a challenge.

Ji Huan could only do her best to translate professional terms like "central nervous system" into words Xin Ziqi could understand.

Although her words often failed to fully convey her meaning and Xin Ziqi struggled to follow, he was more serious than ever. His attitude was even solemn, as if he were listening to a sacred decree.