Chinese Medicine: Starting with Daily Intelligence-Chapter 88: Turtle Garlic Soup Recipe

Songjiang Noodle House.

Guo Yu proposed buying Li Xu’s golden toad skin.

"...Doctor Li, I know the golden toad skin is very precious, and your clinic might need it in the future. Don’t worry, we only want to buy one piece. You can set the price..."

Li Xu remained silent, holding his teacup.

He had two pieces of golden toad skin.

’I did want to keep them for myself. But using them at my clinic is to treat illness, and selling them to the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine would also save someone. Broadly speaking, there’s no real difference. Besides... the intelligence system provides new intel every day. Out with the old, in with the new. If I use up the golden toad skin now, something even better might come along later.’

"No problem."

Li Xu agreed.

"Phew~"

Guo Yu let out a sigh of relief and raised his teacup. "Doctor Li, on behalf of our Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, thank you."

"You’re too kind. It’s all for the sake of treating the sick."

Li Xu raised his cup as well.

"How much are you asking for it?"

"...Fifty thousand. How does that sound?"

He had bought it for two thousand eight hundred, but that was the price for wild, ordinary toad skin.

The effects of the golden toad skin far surpassed those of ordinary toad skin.

His asking price of fifty thousand was neither too high nor too low.

"Okay."

The price was within his expected range, so Guo Yu agreed crisply. "I’ll report to the hospital director tomorrow and do my best to get the money transferred to you."

"Alright. When the money comes through, you can come to my clinic to pick up the medicine."

Neither of them mentioned how to treat the disruptive patient’s liver cirrhosis.

Liver cirrhosis is a complex medical condition.

It was far from comparable to a common cold or fever.

Guo Yu didn’t believe Li Xu was capable of proposing an effective treatment plan. ’After all, Li Xu is too young. Being an expert at treating colds is already impressive enough for someone his age.’

Since Li Xu hadn’t received any intelligence from the system, he didn’t dare say more.

The two of them continued their meal, with both host and guest thoroughly pleased.

...

In the dining room of the Ding Family’s villa, a crystal chandelier cast a warm glow.

Four dishes and a soup were laid out on the mahogany dining table—not extravagant, but exquisite.

Ding Aiguo sat at the head of the table, with his wife, Xue Mei, beside him.

Across from them was his son, Ding Kaifang, who was in his early thirties. He was dressed in a suit, but it couldn’t hide the exhaustion in his eyes.

"Dad, have you seen last quarter’s financial report?" Ding Kaifang asked, putting down his chopsticks. His voice was a little tight.

Ding Aiguo grunted in acknowledgment and continued sipping his soup. "I’ve seen it. Not ideal."

"’Not ideal’ is an understatement." Ding Kaifang took a tablet out of his briefcase and pulled up a set of data. "Real estate only has two small projects underway, and the payback period has stretched to eighteen months. The tourism sector is even worse, with visitor traffic at our scenic areas down forty percent year-over-year."

Ding Aiguo finally looked up, his brow furrowed slightly. "And food and beverage?"

"It’s relatively stable, but it’s only breaking even." Ding Kaifang swiped across the screen. "The biggest problem is the pharmaceutical company..."

Ding Aiguo set down his soup bowl, the metal spoon making a sharp clink against the porcelain. "Hasn’t that patent issue been resolved yet?"

"It can’t be resolved." Ding Kaifang gave a bitter smile. "The patents for our main drugs were already contentious. Now that the big manufacturers are applying pressure, we can’t get through the centralized procurement process at all. All our clients have bailed, and the production lines are about to shut down."

The dining room fell silent for a moment.

The housekeeper came in noiselessly to refill their tea, then tactfully withdrew.

"Dad, I did an analysis." Ding Kaifang pulled up a pie chart. "The pharmaceutical company now only accounts for seven percent of the group’s total business, yet it’s using up fifteen percent of our resources. Rather than letting it continue to be a drain, we should..."

"Shut it down?" Ding Aiguo finished his sentence, tapping his fingers lightly on the tabletop.

Ding Kaifang nodded. "Cut our losses. The pharmaceutical industry is too competitive right now. A small factory like ours, with no proprietary technology and no distribution channels, simply can’t compete with the publicly listed pharmaceutical giants."

Outside, the night grew deeper, and one by one, the garden path lights flickered on.

Ding Aiguo put down his soup spoon and glanced at his wife, who was eating quietly.

He had acquired the pharmaceutical factory back then with the goal of researching a drug to cure his wife.

Now that his wife was well and the pharmaceutical company wasn’t profitable, there was truly no longer any need for it to exist.

"Alright. Once we use up the current batch of raw materials, file for bankruptcy."

...

Early the next morning, Li Xu thought about the day’s intelligence as he opened the clinic’s main door.

Just as he had expected,

today’s intelligence was related to the liver cirrhosis patient with ascites that Guo Yu had mentioned yesterday.

[Today’s Intelligence: A folk remedy for liver cirrhosis with ascites—Turtle Garlic Soup

Ingredients: One soft-shelled turtle (approx. 500g), 100g of raw single-clove garlic...

Method: After slaughtering and gutting the turtle, cook it with the garlic until tender. Do not add salt. Consume plain.

Effects: Enters the liver meridian to nourish yin and subdue yang, break up blood stasis and soften masses, promote diuresis, and reduce abdominal distension.

Indications: Liver cirrhosis with ascites (known in TCM as "Water Gu" or "drum-like abdominal distension"), for patients presenting with symptoms such as an abdomen swollen like a drum, distending pain in the hypochondriac region, a dark and sallow complexion, a dark purple tongue, and a wiry, choppy pulse...]

Li Xu raised an eyebrow. ’This recipe is too simple, isn’t it?’ 𝕗𝕣𝐞𝐞𝘄𝐞𝚋𝚗𝗼𝘃𝗲𝗹.𝚌𝕠𝚖

’Could it actually be effective?’

He walked over to his bookshelf, pulled out a medical text, and looked up the pharmacology of the ingredients in this folk remedy.

Soft-shelled turtle (carapax testudinis): Salty and cold in nature. Enters the liver and kidney meridians. Has the effects of nourishing yin, subduing yang, softening hardness, and resolving nodules.

The turtle’s shell is rich in collagen and trace elements, which can inhibit the process of liver fibrosis and improve hepatic microcirculation.

Single-clove garlic: Pungent and warm, with a moving and dispersing nature. Enters the liver and spleen meridians. It can break up stasis to unblock the channels, move qi, and promote diuresis.

The sulfides in garlic can enhance the liver’s detoxification functions and reduce portal hypertension.

No salt: Patients with liver cirrhosis and ascites must strictly control their sodium intake to avoid worsening water and sodium retention.

Li Xu mused, ’This recipe seems simple, but it actually corresponds precisely to the pathogenesis of liver cirrhosis with ascites: deficiency of liver yin, internal obstruction due to blood stasis, and accumulation of dampness and fluid.’

However, a folk remedy is a folk remedy for a reason: it is not a universally applicable solution, but rather a special piece of experience that varies depending on the person, the specific presentation of the illness, and the timing.

Its effectiveness is often limited to specific constitutions and particular stages of a disease, and may even depend on serendipitous circumstances that are difficult to replicate.

If applied blindly, it might be ineffective at best, or counterproductive at worst—just as the same medicinal herb might save a person with a cold-pattern illness but harm someone with a heat-pattern constitution.

True wisdom lies not in the folk remedy itself, but in the insight to discern when to use it and when to abandon it.

This folk remedy mentioned in the intelligence,

might not be effective for other patients with liver cirrhosis and ascites.

But for that specific patient at the Hospital of Traditional Chinese Medicine, it would be definitively effective.

Just as he was pondering this, his phone rang.

It was Guo Yu.

"Doctor Li, the director has already approved it. The fifty thousand will be transferred to your account shortly." Guo Yu’s voice sounded exhausted. "Is it okay if I head over in a little while to pick up the medicine?"

"No problem." Li Xu glanced at the time. "How is the patient’s condition?"

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end of the line. "Not good... The ascites is severe, and he’s already showing symptoms of mild hepatic encephalopathy. The family is extremely agitated. They smashed up the waiting area again this morning..."

After hanging up, Li Xu stared at the contents of the intelligence report, lost in thought.

’The golden toad skin is precious, but is it really the right medicine for this case? It probably isn’t. Otherwise, the system wouldn’t have given me this new piece of intelligence. And while the Turtle Garlic Soup remedy seems absurd, the intelligence system has never been wrong. Should I tell Guo Yu? But would he even believe in a folk remedy like this?’