The Enhanced Doctor-Chapter 429 Liu Banxia’s hand

(Thanks to good friends firebat1980, reader 20201112175901593, Idle Man, Zhu Hong, Reader 110316151302234 for their monthly ticket encouragement)

The surgery was still ongoing, and those watching, whether in the observation room or in front of their screens, grew even more nervous. 𝘧𝓇𝑒𝑒𝑤ℯ𝑏𝓃𝘰𝑣ℯ𝘭.𝘤ℴ𝘮

What had just transpired were merely the preliminaries, not even appetizers—at best, they were like small pickles. The crucial part was approaching, evident from the solemn expressions on Zhou Shuwen and his team’s faces.

The next step was to dissect these organs from the abdominal cavity and remove them.

Merely exploring the base of the abdominal cavity had already caused a blood vessel to rupture, indicating the enormous difficulty of the current operation. Transplanting them back would be even more challenging.

"It’s so nerve-wracking! I’m lucky I didn’t go into the operating room. Otherwise, I might not have lasted," said Xu Yino.

"Being a doctor is like that," Wang Chao said. "You think you’ve faced enough difficulties, but those are merely the ones at hand. You never know what complex cases are waiting for you."

"You can’t think every doctor is like Banxia. He’s an exception. He’s rare not just in our Second Hospital, but nationwide. How many people reach his level as resident doctors?"

"Did you see his current maneuvers? Even though the director assigned him an auxiliary role, he’s so fast that he’s done much more of the basic dissection and separation work than required."

"This buys the director and Dr. Shi more time to extract the organs, effectively creating more time for this young patient. People often say every minute counts; right now, every second counts."

"Keep up the good work. Besides, Banxia has high hopes for you. You’re the first group he has personally trained, and he’s particularly invested in you. If this surgery succeeds, do you think our emergency center will be short of high-difficulty surgeries in the future?"

Whether the interns heard him or not, he had to say it. This was the task Liu Banxia had given him: to use this surgery as an opportunity to convince all the interns to stay.

The people watching on screen were incredibly tense; one can only imagine the pressure on those performing the surgery in the operating room. Even though the operation had not yet reached its critical stage, beads of sweat had already appeared on the foreheads of the three surgeons.

Whether one felt nervous or not wasn’t something one could simply decide. It was an instinctual bodily response. The fact that they had made no mistakes so far was already remarkable.

"Attention everyone," Zhou Shuwen announced. "We will clamp the aorta and sever the blood vessels shortly."

"Steady and quick. Then, on my command, remove the organs from the abdominal cavity. Liu Banxia, inspect the vessels at the base of the abdominal cavity and select the most suitable ones in preparation for transplantation."

"Alright," Liu Banxia responded.

Zhou Shuwen glanced at them again and nodded forcefully.

Since the preliminary preparations were complete, the severing process was rapid.

"Bring the basin! One, two, three, lift!"

Once the disconnections were complete, Zhou Shuwen calmly called out the commands.

Seeing the organs from the abdominal cavity being placed in a basin lined with ice, everyone breathed a slight sigh of relief. This stage of the work had been completed perfectly.

Zhou Shuwen worked on excising the tumor on one side, while Liu Banxia began to examine the blood vessels at the base of the young patient’s abdominal cavity.

"Rinse. Suction," Liu Banxia instructed.

"How is it looking?" Chen Xuehai asked, leaning in.

"It doesn’t look good," Liu Banxia said. "Although we performed an exploratory procedure just now, the actual situation might be worse than we anticipated."

"There are hardly any viable blood vessels left at the base of the abdominal cavity. Some I daren’t even touch. Using more synthetic blood vessels to replace them probably isn’t a good solution either."

"Teacher Wei, what does Teacher Liu mean? Are there not enough blood vessels at the base of the abdomen for transplantation?" Miao Rui asked.

Wei Yuan nodded, his brow furrowed. "Yes, that’s the case. If blood cannot be reperfused, these organs will fail. It would likely trigger a chain reaction. At that point, we’d have to consider a multi-organ allograft."

"But for this young patient, that’s practically a fantasy. Where could we find so many organs at this moment? Even if we could, he wouldn’t survive that long."

"Now, we just have to see if they can devise a plan in the operating room. The last resort is to use more artificial blood vessels, but that’s equally risky."

In the Chief Director’s office, Chen Zhenxing, Li Mingwu, and Zhou Zhiyong were also staring at the screen, their brows tightly knitted.

They were considering things more deeply than Wei Yuan and understood the true difficulty Liu Banxia was about to face. It was a matter of selection: precisely which blood vessels to choose.

Some of these vessels were very fragile. He would have to visually assess and rank them. If the sequence was wrong and the vessel he favored most ruptured during dissection, a great deal of time would be wasted.

Moreover, the dissection couldn’t begin too early. They had to wait for Zhou Shuwen to finish dealing with the tumor. Otherwise, if something went wrong on Liu Banxia’s end, all of Zhou Shuwen’s work on the tumor would be for naught.

Beyond the primary choices were the backups, and there was no opportunity to assess these backups beforehand either.

Then everyone saw Liu Banxia close his eyes, reach into the young patient’s abdomen, and begin palpating the base of the abdominal cavity.

The only method Liu Banxia could think of was to use his sense of touch to judge the elasticity of the blood vessels and make the final choice.

Although this difficulty had been anticipated, they had treated it as a minor hurdle in their discussions. But now? It had abruptly escalated into a major challenge.

Chen Xuehai didn’t dare interrupt him further, instead focusing on his fingers as they meticulously explored the base of the abdominal cavity.

"The arteries shouldn’t be a major problem; we can proceed as originally planned," Liu Banxia said, opening his eyes.

"If the planned vein is too fragile, we’ll consider the saphenous vein and umbilical vein. Dr. Chen, please keep these in mind for me."

"Okay," Chen Xuehai nodded firmly.

Liu Banxia glanced towards Zhou Shuwen again; their work was also nearing completion.

His heart tensed up again. He was responsible for selecting the blood vessels. Now, he could only rely on his tactile senses and judgment.

"Transplant the organs," Zhou Shuwen said after completing the tumor dissection.

The slightly relaxed atmosphere in the operating room became tense again. Liu Banxia also immediately used a vial of Potent Stabilizing Agent. Even the slightest boost was crucial for him now.

The three of them operated and sutured together. Those in the observation room and those waiting in front of their computer screens felt as though their eyes couldn’t keep up.

Shi Lei was Zhou Shuwen’s apprentice, a true protégé in his master’s lineage.

Like Zhou Shuwen, his hands were always steady. But steady didn’t mean slow. Their speed, or lack thereof, was only slow relative to Liu Banxia’s ’flying needle’ technique.

It was truly as if his needles were flying. Even Liu Banxia himself was experiencing for the first time the sensation brought about by this surge in his suturing speed.

He hadn’t been idle the previous night. He had spent a long time practicing suturing in the Dream Space before sleeping. And now, devoid of any nervousness or pressure, he was completely immersed in the act of suturing.

The simple act of suturing could be surprisingly captivating.

He was deeply engrossed, but the spectators were becoming restless. Initially, they had been conflicted about whom to watch. Now, there was no need for deliberation; they just watched Liu Banxia.

He was suturing so quickly. If there were no issues with the sutures after blood circulation was restored, that would be a true success.

Many of his close acquaintances were nervously sweating bullets for him. It was precisely because he sutured so quickly that they were so worried. If an error occurred, regardless of whether it was related to his suturing speed or not, it would be attributed to him.

"This vein won’t work; it’s too short. What’s the alternative?" Shi Lei asked at this moment.

"The saphenous vein and umbilical vein," Chen Xuehai replied hastily.

"Okay, I’ll dissect the saphenous vein," Shi Lei responded.

After speaking, he immediately began to work. This stemmed from his trust in Liu Banxia. Since Liu Banxia had provided the alternatives, they should proceed with them.

"This one of mine isn’t working either. I’ll graft it onto the umbilical vein. Banxia, be careful," Zhou Shuwen also said after a moment.

Everyone’s hearts leaped into their throats again. These two veins were the only alternatives Liu Banxia had proposed. If Liu Banxia encountered problems with his part as well, they would likely have no other options left.

This was another difficulty in the young patient’s surgery: some of the blood vessels were simply too fragile.

Time ticked by slowly. People hardly dared to breathe. Everyone was intently watching the procedure. It was almost over. Please, let nothing go wrong!

Maybe it was because of everyone’s prayers, or perhaps the young patient was extremely fortunate; no further problems occurred during the remainder of the surgery.

"Everyone, watch closely," Zhou Shuwen said. "We’ll restore blood flow shortly. If you see any bleeding points, address them immediately."

No one spoke; they just nodded in unison. After working so hard for so long, it was now time to see the results of their labor.

With the restoration of blood flow, Zhou Shuwen, Shi Lei, and Liu Banxia quickly began to observe. Each was responsible for the sections they had sutured, so they could identify any problems the fastest.

"Clear on my end!" Zhou Shuwen called out, excitement in his voice.

"Nothing here either!" Shi Lei added immediately.

Then, everyone’s gaze focused on Liu Banxia.

The cheeky fellow didn’t speak, merely giving an "OK" sign.

Zhou Shuwen ignored him and turned to look at the monitor instead.

"Vital signs are stable! The surgery is a success!" Wang Lei shouted forcefully, pumping his fist.

Although he wasn’t the lead surgeon, as the anesthesiologist, he played an equally crucial role in the operating room. He was in charge of monitoring the patient’s vital signs, making him the most appropriate person to make the announcement.

In an instant, a wave of jubilation swept through both inside and outside the operating room. They had actually pulled off such a highly difficult surgery.