Chapter 705: Chapter 704: Survival Time

At 8:30 on Friday morning, Yan Feifan arrived at the Cardiothoracic Surgery Department.

This time, he only brought Pan Jichuan with him.

As for Yu Beihua and Li Tianlin, they had spent all night running tests on the experimental monkey, and some of the results wouldn’t be available until that morning.

Zhu Jian and Berry stayed behind at the Little Red House as the on-call doctors. They were conducting a discharge examination for the girl who had plastic surgery last week and also looking after another girl who had her procedure yesterday.

As Yan Feifan walked into the department, he noticed that every doctor and nurse he passed had a smile they couldn’t quite contain.

He knew they were laughing about the incident where he was chased by a pig.

This made Yan Feifan a little indignant.

’What’s so funny about that? If you were chased by a crazed pig, you’d look even more pathetic than I did.’

He put on a frosty expression that kept everyone at arm’s length and walked to Mr. Liang’s office.

"Feifan, you’re here. Today, you’ll be with me. You’re going to be my assistant for a heart transplant surgery."

Hearing this, Yan Feifan asked in pleasant surprise, "What a coincidence! Did a donor heart just become available?"

Liang Zhao Kui grunted in affirmation. "The donor was an accident victim from Chuan Province. Resuscitation efforts failed, and he was pronounced dead at seven this morning."

"The donor heart is expected to arrive here at ten."

"Come on, let’s go do the preoperative examination on the transplant recipient."

Yan Feifan, with Pan Jichuan in tow, eagerly followed Liang Zhao Kui out of the office.

In addition to the two of them, eleven of Mr. Liang’s students and assistants also followed along.

Including Mr. Liang himself, there were fourteen of them in total. They moved with a powerful stride that seemed to generate a wind, taking up the entire corridor.

The scene was quite a spectacle.

The medical staff walking ahead of their group either picked up their pace or broke into a trot to get out of their way more quickly.

As for those coming from the opposite direction, they would consciously press themselves against the wall to clear a path.

"Feifan..."

Liang Zhao Kui said as they walked, "A few of us discussed it. Given your solid foundation, excellent technique, and strong learning ability..."

"We’ve decided to have you participate directly in various types of cardiac surgeries for hands-on instruction."

Yan Feifan chuckled. "Mr. Liang, I like this way of learning very much!"

Liang Zhao Kui also smiled lightly. "Feifan, aside from being our assistant, helping us in surgery, and learning by listening to our explanations, you’ll also have an assignment."

"Mr. Liang, what kind of assignment?" Yan Feifan asked at the opportune moment.

Liang Zhao Kui smiled. "You assisted Dr. Peng with a tongue reduction surgery and gave him a post-op report afterward that contained twenty-one questions and your personal suggestions. He found it very enlightening."

"The assignment we’re giving you is..."

"After the surgery, you are to write a high-quality post-op report for us as well."

Yan Feifan grimaced and explained, "Mr. Liang, the reason I could raise so many questions for Dr. Peng was because I had done a lot of preparation and preliminary work on tongue reduction surgery beforehand."

"Besides, Dr. Peng’s surgical technique at the time did have some... questionable aspects."

Hearing this, the corners of Liang Zhao Kui’s mouth turned up involuntarily, and he shook his head gently.

’This kid, Feifan, is still a bit too blunt. It’s a good thing that fellow Peng Zhanghua is so good-tempered.’

Liang Zhao Kui interrupted, "Feifan, judging by the skill you demonstrated during the heart transplant on the live pig this Monday, you shouldn’t need any preliminary preparation, right?"

Yan Feifan nodded. "I don’t need any more preparation for heart transplant surgery, that’s true. The problem is other types of surgery..."

Liang Zhao Kui cut in again. "Aside from emergency procedures, we’ll notify you in advance for any other surgeries we perform, giving you some time to do your homework."

Yan Feifan said, "Oh," and listened as Liang Zhao Kui continued, "The surgeries we’ll have you learn from will certainly be representative and difficult cases."

"In a complex surgery that lasts several hours, it’s impossible for us to perform perfectly in every aspect. There may be improper handling, or even outright mistakes!"

"Feifan, use your Eyes of Golden Flame and help us find them."

Yan Feifan stated, "Mr. Liang, I’ll do my best."

Liang Zhao Kui nodded in satisfaction and added encouragingly, "Feifan, we’ve discussed it. If you do a good job on these post-op reports, there’s a reward."

"What’s the reward?" Yan Feifan asked curiously.

Liang Zhao Kui said teasingly, "That depends on the quality of your report. The better the quality, the more handsome the reward. It’ll be a pleasant surprise..."

As they spoke, the group of more than ten people arrived at a patient room on the seventh floor.

The patient was a forty-six-year-old man suffering from severe heart failure caused by coronary artery disease. He had been on the heart transplant list for four months.

For this patient, waiting only four months was considered quite lucky.

The patient was so agitated he was continuously taking deep breaths of oxygen, and his family members at his side were so happy their eyes were red-rimmed.

Yan Feifan learned that the patient was from out of town.

To avoid missing a sudden opportunity like today’s, they hadn’t returned home to recuperate but had rented an apartment near the hospital.

A series of examinations showed that the patient’s physical condition was relatively good and he could withstand the major surgery. He was then wheeled to the operating room.

Yan Feifan also followed Mr. Liang to the surgical area to prepare for the operation.

"Feifan, Zhou Xian has submitted his resignation!"

The words startled Yan Feifan, who asked urgently, "Did something happen to the heart transplant patient he was in charge of?"

Liang Zhao Kui shook his head. "No. The patient is past the one-month post-operative critical period, and his cardiac function tests are normal."

"You could say his surgery was a success."

"Then why is he resigning?" Yan Feifan was very puzzled.

Liang Zhao Kui sighed softly. "He said the pressure of working at the Affiliated Hospital is too high, and that the success of this heart transplant has proven his abilities."

"He’s planning to move to a hospital where the work pressure isn’t as intense."

Yan Feifan found this reason a little hard to understand.

"If he really wants to leave, shouldn’t he strike while the iron is hot, push hard for another year to get promoted to chief physician, and then leave?"

"He’s failed the promotion evaluation three times already, and he’s just giving up like this? Leaving with the title of chief physician from the Affiliated Hospital would get him benefits more than double that of an associate chief physician."

Liang Zhao Kui chuckled. "He won’t do badly leaving like this, either."

"There are many Class A Grade 3 hospitals actively applying for heart transplant certification. With a successful heart transplant case under his belt, he’ll be a hot commodity."

Yan Feifan let out a soft "oh."

After they had both prepared, they walked into the operating room and received a concrete update: the heart was en route and expected to arrive in seventeen minutes.

Seeing that Mr. Liang hadn’t started yet, Yan Feifan asked, confused, "Mr. Liang, shouldn’t we be starting the surgery?"

"If we time it right and the handover is smooth, we could have everything ready on our end just as the heart arrives..."

Yan Feifan said hopefully, "Every minute we finish the surgery earlier is a minute less of damage to the heart."

Liang Zhao Kui said in a grave voice, "Feifan, your thinking is good, but what if there’s an accident while the heart is in transit?"

"Things like that have happened before in reality. The patient’s body can’t take that kind of ordeal."

"I can only begin the surgery once the heart has been delivered here and inspected to confirm it’s viable."

Yan Feifan gave a soft "oh" as if he’d been taught a lesson, but inwardly he disagreed.

’To delay the surgery by nearly an hour for such a low-probability event... it seems like the costs outweigh the benefits.’

After an organ leaves the human body, under current preservation conditions, the time it can remain viable—its survival time—is limited.

A heart, for example, can survive for five hours when preserved in a special electrolyte solution.

In other words, the interval between when a heart is removed from one person and transplanted into another cannot exceed five hours.

However, Yan Feifan had read a report that a medical research institution in the United States had recently developed a new set of equipment.

This equipment could keep a heart beating outside the body for twenty-four hours.

But no matter how long an organ could be preserved, it was obvious that the sooner it was transplanted into the patient, the better the recovery would be.

After another seventeen minutes of patient waiting, Liang Zhao Kui finally received a report from his assistant: the heart had arrived and was confirmed to be viable upon inspection.

"Now, we can begin the surgery..."

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