CHAPTER 124: LIU BANXIA IS NOT OMNIPOTENT.

"Dr. Liu, Dr. Liu, wake up! We have two car accident victims on the way, arriving any minute!"

Liu Banxia was sleeping soundly when Shen Lin rushed in.

The moment Shen Lin finished speaking, Liu Banxia sat bolt upright and groggily followed her out. In reality, his mind was completely blank; he had no idea what was happening.

"Wang Huan, two patients. One is a woman in her sixties, the other a driver in his thirties. Both are severely injured," Chen Jianxin stated.

Liu Banxia rubbed his face. "Brother Wang, no other way around it, you’ll have to assist me. Have we called the general surgery doctors?"

Wang Huan nodded. When they were short-staffed, any available doctor had to step up.

"They’ve been called, along with neurosurgery. The female patient is more critical; she has a cranial hematoma," Shen Lin quickly added.

"Brother Chen, Brother Wang and I will take the female patient," Liu Banxia decided without hesitation.

Chen Jianxin nodded in agreement.

About three minutes later, two ambulances roared into the emergency bay.

"Female, around 60 years old, unconscious. Blood pressure 60/80, heart rate 110. She has a head injury with a hematoma from striking the roadside, abdominal contusions, and a fractured left leg. We intubated and started fluids on site, but her blood pressure hasn’t come up," the paramedic reported.

"Resuscitation Room One!" Liu Banxia directed, helping to push the gurney as they rushed into the room.

"One, two, three, lift! Connect the monitor! Five units of O-negative blood. Start another IV line for rapid blood and fluid replacement. Get the portable ultrasound!" Liu Banxia rapidly ordered upon reaching the resuscitation room.

"Pupils unresponsive," Wang Huan reported after his examination.

Liu Banxia palpated the patient’s abdomen. "Book the OR; there’s no time for a CT scan or ultrasound. Massive internal bleeding. We need to do an exploratory laparotomy. Brother Wang, contact the on-call administrator and brief them on the situation."

Without the slightest delay, everyone sprang into action as Liu Banxia finished speaking, pushing the gurney rapidly out of the room.

He recalled the minor mishap during the last emergency case and was determined to avoid any procedural problems this time.

Upon reaching the operating room, Liu Banxia scrubbed in with maximum speed.

"Oh, Sister Zhao, you’re on duty today. The patient is unaccompanied; some information is missing," Liu Banxia quickly said upon seeing Zhao Feng, today’s anesthesiologist.

Zhao Feng nodded. "I heard the other driver also needs immediate surgery. Liwei is preparing for it now."

"Dr. Liu, what’s the situation?" Just then, Li Jun, the attending general surgeon, walked in.

"Brother Li, I’m afraid I’ll need your help. There’s another surgery in the adjacent OR; we’re swamped," Liu Banxia said quickly.

Li Jun nodded with a smile. "Sure. Shi Lei has praised you highly. Let me know when you’re doing a small-incision appendectomy; I’ll have to come watch."

"Okay, let’s proceed with the exploratory laparotomy," Liu Banxia announced.

As he incised the abdomen, fresh blood welled up from the opening.

"Blood pressure dropping," Zhao Feng reported.

"Rapid transfusion and fluid replacement! Suction! Damn it, the spleen’s unsalvageable—it’s shattered! Hemostats!" Liu Banxia commanded immediately after palpating the area.

Taking the hemostats, Liu Banxia plunged them into the pool of blood and, after a moment of probing, successfully clamped the splenic artery.

"Blood pressure stabilizing, starting to rise," Zhao Feng announced, glancing at the monitor.

"That was beautifully done," Li Jun commented. "Even knowing one *should* clamp the splenic artery, not everyone could do it so accurately under these conditions."

"Don’t praise me too much, Brother Li," Liu Banxia said with a wry smile. "Perhaps I just have a certain affinity for the splenic artery, so I can locate it fairly accurately."

After suctioning the blood from the abdominal cavity, Liu Banxia began the splenectomy in earnest.

"The patient next door seems to be in critical condition as well; I saw Chen Xuehai go in. How are things on your end?" At that moment, Zhang Xiao, the attending neurosurgeon, entered.

"Sigh... how did the driver get so badly injured? We’re stable for now, but it’s hard to say what the future holds. After we remove the spleen and stabilize the leg fracture, we’ll have to assess her head," Liu Banxia replied with a grimace.

His movements were swift and efficient. He had witnessed Wei Yuan’s operations and practiced diligently for countless nights in the dream space. Li Jun, observing from the side, nodded repeatedly in approval. He’d only heard this young doctor was fast, but this was truly impressive speed.

Especially when Liu Banxia handled the splenic hilum, his movements were not only rapid but also remarkably steady. This area is adjacent to the pancreatic tail. Merely prioritizing speed could injure the pancreatic tail, while incomplete dissection could damage the splenic artery and vein.

During the procedure, he also avoided excessive traction, as that could tear the hilar blood vessels.

Every organ in the human body is interconnected; you can’t just pluck out a spleen as if you were picking an eggplant.

It would take me at least thirty-five minutes to perform this rapid splenectomy, Li Jun mentally calculated. And Liu Banxia? He seemed to have finished in under thirty minutes!

After irrigating the abdominal cavity, Liu Banxia meticulously checked the retroperitoneum, diaphragmatic surface, greater curvature of the stomach, and the pancreatic tail. Once he confirmed there were no further bleeding points, he placed a drainage tube and closed the abdomen.

Usually, he would let his first assistant handle this, but today they had external help. He couldn’t possibly ask Li Jun to do such a task.

"My goodness, that speed is incredible!" Zhang Xiao exclaimed, having watched the entire procedure.

"We’ve heard so much about Dr. Liu’s speed. Both Li Liwei and Wang Lei couldn’t stop praising him when they got back," Zhao Feng added.

"Please, everyone, don’t praise me so much," Liu Banxia said modestly. "You’ll make me blush."

"This isn’t flattery; it’s the truth. I genuinely can’t match your speed," Li Jun stated.

"Dr. Zhang, what’s your preliminary assessment of the patient’s head injury?" Liu Banxia asked after examining the patient’s leg.

"Based on the pre-admission information, the outlook isn’t optimistic. We’ll have to wait for the CT scan to know more," Dr. Zhang said. "Aren’t you going to wait for imaging before you deal with that leg?" he then asked curiously.

"It’s fine. It’s a tibial fracture, but blood flow to the leg is normal, and no vessels were damaged. I’ve already reduced it. We just need to apply a cast, and that’s it," Liu Banxia replied casually.

He genuinely didn’t think much of it, but to the others in the operating room, his casual confidence was astounding.

For him to speak and act with such assurance meant he was either recklessly arrogant or supremely confident in his skills. Such confidence implied a high level of proficiency in bone-setting for these types of fractures.

Everyone had seen it clearly: he had simply run his fingers carefully over the tibia, then, pinching the suspected fracture site with his left hand, he gave a couple of deft movements with his right, and it was done.

The procedure looked simple, but not many attending orthopedic surgeons would dare attempt it without X-rays. The only one who would was Director Xu, the renowned orthopedic maestro.

"No wonder Director Xu let you play with the skeletal model; you truly have a gift for this," Li Jun remarked, a hint of envy in his tone.

"Um... how do you apply a cast, exactly?" Liu Banxia asked with a serious expression.

Everyone froze for a moment, then looked at him with peculiar expressions.

"I’ve honestly forgotten how to apply a cast. I only saw it done once during my orthopedics rotation," Liu Banxia confessed, somewhat sheepishly.

Zhang Xiao and the others were momentarily speechless. He could reduce bones with such finesse, yet he didn’t know the basics of applying a cast. They felt a slight sense of relief. So, this kid isn’t omnipotent after all.