Chinese Medicine: Starting with Daily Intelligence-Chapter 64: Treating Sickness with Almond Drink
Li Xu looked at today’s intelligence report.
He was overcome with emotion.
’I’ve really done it!’
That patient from yesterday... his condition wasn’t overly complex, but the signs were definitely subtle.
Even the attending physician at the District Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine had gotten it wrong.
Yet he had managed to diagnose it correctly.
This was proof enough that he had improved.
A huge improvement, in fact.
Of course, it helped that the other doctor had already ruled out the wrong diagnosis for him.
If Wang Ruiying had brought her son to him first, he might have also misdiagnosed the condition as one requiring Chaihu.
Since he’d made the right diagnosis yesterday...
If the patient drank the almond drink, his symptoms should have started to ease last night.
Li Xu found himself eagerly awaiting the family’s arrival.
...
Wang Ruiying woke just as the sky began to lighten.
She had only gotten a little over two hours of sleep.
Her mind was consumed with thoughts of her son’s illness.
Sleep was impossible.
She got out of bed, went to her son’s bedside, and felt his forehead—it was normal!
To her even greater surprise, her son sat up on his own and said he needed to use the bathroom.
"Mommy, I have to go poo-poo," her son said, rubbing his eyes.
Wang Ruiying hurried him to the bathroom.
A moment later, her son came bouncing out. "Mommy, it didn’t hurt today!"
She rushed in to check and saw that, sure enough, his stool in the toilet was no longer hard and pellet-like, but had become much softer.
The color in her son’s face was much better than yesterday, his cheeks flushed with a healthy pink.
She flushed the toilet.
Wang Ruiying crouched down and asked, "Sweetheart, are you still coughing?"
Her son shook his head, then let out a sudden sneeze. He froze, stunned. "Huh? I’m not hiccuping anymore?" He had always called his coughs "hiccups."
Wang Ruiying swept her son into a hug, overjoyed.
She thought back to her skepticism from the previous night, and her cheeks burned.
That can of almond drink she’d dismissed had actually worked!
And most importantly, it had only been one night.
Just from a single can of almond drink.
If Li Xu were to prescribe some actual, proper medicine...
’Wouldn’t it work even faster?’
"Son, finish up... after breakfast, we’ll go see the doctor again."
At the breakfast table, her son, for the first time in ages, finished a whole bowl of congee and even asked for half a steamed bun.
As she served him some more food, Wang Ruiying recalled Li Xu’s words.
"Almonds can relieve wheezing and replenish lung fluids, and they can also moisten the intestines to ease constipation..."
She repeated his words, and suddenly, something clicked. She quickly pulled out her phone to search.
The TCM pharmacology information that popped up on her screen confirmed Li Xu’s diagnosis:
Almond: Nature: warm. Flavor: bitter. Meridians: Lung, Large Intestine. Actions: Stops cough and calms wheezing, moistens the intestines and unblocks the bowels.
Indications: Coughing and wheezing, constipation due to intestinal dryness.
"So that’s it!" Wang Ruiying exclaimed, slapping the table and startling her son.
She quickly soothed her son, knowing in her heart that this was it—the diagnosis was spot on.
If the diagnosis hadn’t been correct, it never would have been this effective.
After breakfast,
Wang Ruiying hurried downstairs with her son in her arms again.
Once on Construction Road,
she happened to see Aunt Li sweeping the street.
She eagerly approached her. "Aunt Li," she said excitedly, "you were right! Li Xu’s medical skills are on par with his father’s now."
Aunt Li immediately perked up, putting down her broom with a gossipy expression. "Quick, tell me, what happened?"
Wang Ruiying couldn’t wait to share. "Yesterday evening, I was passing by Li’s Traditional Chinese Medicine Clinic and saw it was open, so I went in... Li Xu gave this long analysis... I didn’t understand most of it... but because the clinic was out of one of the herbs, he told me to buy a can of almond drink for my son... I figured I’d give it a try, so I bought one, took it home, gave it to my son, and guess what?"
Aunt Li played along perfectly. "Your son’s all better?"
"Not that fast."
Wang Ruiying shook her head. "Before this, my son would wake up coughing several times a night, and each time it was so bad it felt like the ceiling was shaking. But last night, he only had a few light coughs and slept soundly the whole night through. So here I am, bright and early, to get a real prescription from Doctor Li."
"See? I told you so! Xiao Xu has truly inherited his father’s skill. Heh heh, from now on, all us old neighbors will be in good hands," Aunt Li said, looking very pleased.
"Aunt Li, I have to run. I’m heading to the clinic."
"Go on, then."
...
Li Xu finished his breakfast.
He raised the clinic’s rolling shutter door.
He was officially open for business.
A few moments later, Song Sisi walked in, carrying steamed buns.
"Good morning, Boss."
He hadn’t seen her in a few days.
Song Sisi was her usual cheerful self, but she quickly sensed something was different about Li Xu.
"Boss, I don’t know... ever since you got back from the mountains, you seem a bit different."
"Different how?"
"Um... I can’t quite put my finger on it... You seem more confident... Did you find some good herbs?"
Song Sisi tilted her head, studying him.
Li Xu smiled.
’A woman’s intuition is sharp, indeed.’
After receiving confirmation from the system’s intelligence report today,
he felt as if he had undergone a sort of apotheosis.
He was far more confident in his medical skills.
And a person’s self-confidence manifests in their upright posture, the rhythm of their walk, and even their everyday movements.
"You’re not wrong. I found some good herbs."
Li Xu said as he organized the herb cabinets.
A van from the City Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine pulled up at the entrance.
Hu Qiming and a nurse got out.
They walked straight into the clinic.
"Huh? I didn’t think it was the weekend."
"It’s not. It’s Tuesday."
"Then what are you doing here?"
"You forgot? Your clinic was closed last weekend, so we couldn’t do our support visit. We’re here today to take the photos and fill out the paperwork."
"Right."
Li Xu understood. ’They’re here to fake the records.’
"Sisi, help them move a table to the doorway, and then take their picture."
"You got it."
The group got busy with their charade.
Just then, Wang Ruiying walked in with her son in her arms. The moment she entered, she said excitedly, "Doctor Li, you’re incredible! My son drank one can of the almond drink, and he barely coughed last night."
Li Xu smiled. "That’s because we found the right diagnosis. I’ll write you a prescription today that should cure him completely."
"I trust you."
Wang Ruiying nodded emphatically.
"What’s going on?"
Hu Qiming, finished with his photos, came over to see what the commotion was about.
Wang Ruiying glanced at the white coat Hu Qiming was wearing, which bore the name of the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, and curled her lip in disdain. "A doctor from your hospital almost delayed my son’s treatment. We were lucky to find Doctor Li."
"Hm?"
Hu Qiming was completely baffled.
Wang Ruiying’s words came out like a machine gun as she rattled off the whole story.
"...Doctor Li is the really skilled one. He stopped my son’s cough with a single can of almond drink. He’s much better than the doctors at your Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine."
"Er..."
Being "humiliated" to his face by a patient’s mother, Hu Qiming’s face flushed bright red.
He looked over at Li Xu, his eyes filled with astonishment.
Based on the patient’s mother’s description,
he knew full well that without a wealth of experience, accurately diagnosing the boy’s condition would have been incredibly difficult.
He felt ashamed; he knew he wasn’t as skilled.
This was precisely why he still wasn’t seeing patients on his own.
"Which doctor did you register to see?"
"...I think his name was Guo Yu... He’s an attending physician, you know."
"We don’t have an attending physician named Guo Yu at our hospital," Hu Qiming said, his brow furrowed.
"You don’t? How is that possible..."
Wang Ruiying wondered if she had remembered wrong. Then, she got a clear look at the name on Hu Qiming’s white coat: City Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine.
"Oh, sorry, my mistake. I took him to the Guanghe District Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine."
"The District Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine?"
Hu Qiming breathed a sigh of relief. A moment later, his eyes lit up. He pulled out his phone, opened a group chat with his old classmates, and typed, "@Miaoli, do you guys have a doctor named Guo Yu at your hospital?"
