Chapter 229: Looking, Listening, Questioning and Feeling the Pulse!
The clinic was open.
Xu Miaolin, of course, sat before the only consultation table.
Fang Qiu sat beside him.
“Today, I’ll talk about the four ways of diagnosis to you, and tell you how our doctors of Chinese Medicine understand a patient’s physical condition through looking, listening, questioning and feeling his pulse,” Xu Miaolin said to Fang Qiu.
“Okay.”
Fang Qiu nodded. He had been expecting this for a long time.
He didn’t wait a long time, and a patient entered the clinic soon.
Seen from afar, he was a middle-aged man at about 40. He had a little hunchback, and his face consumed away. He should have been at his vigorous age. However, he looked totally gaunt.
Entering the clinic, he raised his head and then got stunned immediately.
He had been here several times and was familiar with Feng Xuexin. But to his surprise, the man sitting at the consultation table today was changed.
And there were two people before the table?
Confused, he began to look around for Feng Xuexin.
At the same time, Feng Xuexin, who had been standing in front of the medicine counter, immediately walked out, asking, “What are you looking for?”
“Cough, cough…”
“Doctor Feng, why are there two men sitting at your table?”
After coughing, the middle-aged man reached out to point at Fang Qiu and Xu Miaolin and asked Feng Xuexin.
“I don’t see patients today.”
Feng Xuexin grinned and answered, “You’re lucky today. That is a highly skilled doctor who is much better than me.”
While speaking, he hurriedly pointed at Xu Miaolin.
“Really?”
The middle-aged man arched his eyebrows, looking happy.
Although Feng Xuexin’s medical skills were very good, he was still not a famous doctor after all. Therefore, he knew some diseases of difficulty, but he couldn’t cure them.
The middle-aged man suffered such a disease, which had troubled him for a long time.
Although Feng Xuexin could control his condition every time, it would relapse after a short period, which made him very helpless. He had even suspected that Feng Xuexin had done some tricks on him to earn more money from him. It was after he had gone to another doctor that his suspicion had dissipated.
Now, he heard that Xu Miaolin was more skilled than Feng Xuexin, so he would have the opportunity to cure his disease, wouldn’t he?
“Of course yes. He’s my father’s friend. How can’t he be skilled?”
Over there, while the middle-aged man and Feng Xuexin were chatting, Xu Miaolin was explaining to Fang Qiu as well.
“Look at this patient.”
Studying the middle-aged man carefully, Xu Miaolin said, “It can be told from his face that he is listless and gaunt. His back is a little bent, and he often coughs.”
“Besides, looking carefully, you will find he breathes more than average people on his way into the clinic, which means he is short of breath.”
“Look at his lips. Unlike normal lips, they are purple. These are all symptoms.”
Xu Miaolin stopped here to look at Fang Qiu.
“Yes.”
Fang Qiu nodded. Everything that Xu Miaolin had mentioned was seen in his eyes clearly. But he also discovered something that Xu Miaolin didn’t. He uttered directly, “He is hurt in the lung.”
Upon hearing that, Xu Miaolin was stunned.
Even Feng Xuexin at the medicine counter also turned his head to Fang Qiu.
“Uncle Xu, didn’t you say that he hasn’t learned medicine?”
Feng Xuexin asked Xu Miaolin while looking at him with suspicion.
However, Xu Miaolin was looking at Fang Qiu with surprise, asking, “How do you know that?”
“I know martial arts. I can hear it from his coughs,” Fang Qiu explained with a smile.
Indeed, he could tell from a person’s voice that something was wrong with him.
Of course, it was limited.
He couldn’t tell all the diseases, but only those related to voice. The most critical thing was that he could only tell the problem, but he didn’t know the disease.
For example, upon hearing the patient’s coughs, he knew that the other side was suffering from a lung problem, but he didn’t know what disease he was suffering.
“Good!”
Xu Miaolin’s eyes lit up. He said, “I never thought you could do that.”
Fang Qiu revealed a humble smile.
He never told anyone that he knew martial arts.
If he hadn’t let it slip unwittingly, he might have kept it secret.
“What a skilled doctor!”
The middle-aged man’s eyes lit up. He came over to the consultation table immediately and said hurriedly, “Doctor, you must take a look at me and cure my disease.”
It was the first time he had seen a doctor who could tell his disease without even questioning him.
Now, he had believed that these two doctors were both more skilled than Feng Xuexin.
He couldn’t miss such a good opportunity to cure his disease.
“Sit down, please.”
Looking at the patient, Xu Miaolin smiled and invited him to sit down.
“Tell me more about your physical condition, please.”
After the patient had sat down, Xu Miaolin opened his mouth and asked.
“I can’t tell it clearly.”
The middle-aged man replied with a frown, “It’s just that I always feel uncomfortable. Sometimes, I would be very afraid of coldness. Sometimes, I would have a fever and feel very hot. And usually, I would feel weak, refusing to use strength.”
Xu Miaolin nodded and continued to ask, “How about your appetite?”
Fang Qiu, at the same time, was sitting to the side, listening and learning quietly and carefully.
“Not so good.”
The middle-aged man shook his head and said, “I can eat. But always, I don’t want to eat, because I have no appetite.”
“Do you sweat a lot?” Xu Miaolin asked again.
“Yes.”
The middle-aged man quickly nodded and answered. “Sometimes, there would be a lot, but sometimes not so much. Anyway, in general, I sweat more than before.”
“Afraid of coldness, suffering fevers, weak and effortless, short of appetite, sweating…”
Sitting to the side, Fang Qiu was listening to the dialogue between Xu Miaolin and the patient carefully, and recording the symptoms the patient said constantly.
“Cough, cough!”
After the questions, the patient made a heavy cough and spat his sputum into the nearby trash can.
“Now, it’s time to look.”
Xu Miaolin reminded Fang Qiu.
Fang Qiu immediately looked into the trash can.
Upon that, he discovered immediately that the patient had coughed with a lot of purulent sputum. Besides, the patient had the symptom of hemoptysis, because blood could be clearly seen in the purulent phlegm. Since the trash can was near Fang Qiu, he could even sense a stench.
“Have you seen it clearly?” Xu Miaolin asked.
“Yes.”
Fang Qiu immediately nodded.
“Good.”
Xu Miaolin smiled satisfactorily, and then explained, “From these symptoms, it can be basically concluded that he has a lung carbuncle. In Western Medicine, it is called a lung abscess, and it has developed into a carbuncle.
“Lung carbuncle is formed due to toxic heat in the lung, resulting in sores in the lung, developing into abscesses. Its main symptoms include fever, cough, pain in the chest, hemoptysis, smelly purulent sputum, and even blood sputum.
“There are three stages of this disease—the early stage, the carbuncle stage, and the fester stage.
“The symptoms of the carbuncle stage are coughing with a lot of blood sputum suddenly, or abnormally smelly porridge-like sputum. Sometimes, patients will have hemoptysis and pain in the chest out of vexation. Some will even be short of breath and can’t lie flat. Their body will be heated and their faces red. They will be thirsty and prefer drinking. Their tongue will be red with yellow coating. Moreover, their pulses will feel slippery or vigorous.”
Then, he asked Fang Qiu to diagnose.
“Please open your mouth and let me see your tongue,” Fang Qiu uttered.
The patient opened his mouth wide.
With a close look, Fang Qiu indeed found that the patient’s tongue was red with yellow coating.
After that, he immediately reached out to feel the patient’s pulse.
As expected, his pulse felt slippery and also rapid!
Looking at the performance of Fang Qiu, Xu Miaolin, beside him, began to nod with satisfaction.
Then he said, “To cure this disease, the main treatment is to drain the purulence to detoxify.”
He started writing a prescription while speaking.
“Platycodon Grandiflorus Soup.”
“Platycodon grandiflorus, 2.5 grams; semen coicis, 15.6 grams; Fritillaria, 4.7 grams; dried orange peel, 2.5 grams; honeysuckle, 15.6 grams; licorice root, 4.7 grams; semen lepidii, 2.5 grams; rhizoma bletillae, 2.5 grams.”
Suddenly, Xu Miaolin paused for a while, and then began to speak while writing, “Since the patient has hemoptysis, we can add some medicine materials which are helpful with cooling blood, removing blood stasis and helping hemostasis, such as moutan barks, gardenia jasminoides, cattail pollen, lotus roots, panax pseudo-ginseng.”
As soon as he stopped speaking, the prescription was also finished.
“Don’t be urgent to cure it. You have to be patient and get cured slowly little by little. Take the medicine three times first, and I’ll change the prescription according to the situation after you reach the recovery stage.”
Xu Miaolin instructed as he handed the prescription to the patient.
“Okay. Thank you, doctor.”
The middle-aged man nodded immediately, took the prescription and hurried to the medicine cabinet where Feng Xuexin was.
Before the medicine cabinet, Feng Xuexin had been observing Xu Miaolin’s treatment.
He was very jealous to see Fang Qiu sitting beside Xu Miaolin.
It would be so good if he could sit at Fang Qiu’s place!
“Doctor Feng, fill the prescription.”
The patient handed over the prescription.
Feng Xuexin took it over immediately, copied it out jovially, and then began to fill it up for the patient according to the prescribed dosage.
This patient had come to him many times.
But he hadn’t cured him thoroughly.
Now that Xu Miaolin had a way to cure him, Feng Xuexin must learn it. At least, he had to write down all the prescriptions to cure this disease for fear that he still couldn’t cure it if he met it again in the future.
Xu Miaolin refused to accept Feng Xuexin as a disciple, but he couldn’t stop Feng Xuexin learning from him secretly.
After filling his prescription, the patient left immediately. Seeing the hope of a cure, he went home to boil medicine quickly.
In the middle of waiting for the second patient, Fang Qiu seized the time to keep in mind what had happened just now, and then refined it.
After he had done with that, the second patient came in.
He was also a middle-aged man.
With the experience of the previous one, Fang Qiu began to observe this patient with Xu Miaolin from afar, before the patient entered the door this time. From the patient’s face, his walking posture, to a variety of small movements, he observed every detail carefully.
However, seeming to be in a hurry, the patient rushed to the consultation table and sat down after just a few steps.
The diagnosis began.
Xu Miaolin started to explain to Fang Qiu while diagnosing slowly, in accordance with the process of looking, listening, questioning, and feeling the pulse.
The patient was unsatisfied with Xu Miaolin’s speed.
“Doctor, can you hurry up?”
Looking at Xu Miaolin, the patient urged.
“Sure.”
Xu Miaolin nodded with a smile and then said, “But quick diagnosis is not free. If you allow me to slow down, the treatment is free, and you just need to pay for the medicine.”
“Really?”
The patient got stunned. Encountering such a good thing, he hurriedly replied, “Then… You can slow down. Don’t be urgent. I have time. Slow down, and you can observe carefully, right? I can also listen carefully to what disease I have exactly.”
“Okay.”
Xu Miaolin nodded and continued.
Fang Qiu also listened carefully.
He kept all the details and points Xu Miaolin mentioned in his mind.
After the blink of an eye, the morning passed.
During this period, Xu Miaolin had seen more than ten patients in total.
“You diagnose the next one, and I’ll sit beside you and listen.”
Feeling that Fang Qiu had learned enough, Xu Miaolin stood up and said.
“Okay.”
Fang Qiu nodded.
The two switched their seats.
Over there, Feng Xuexin also became interested in it. He came out from the medicine counter with a grin and whispered, “I’d like to see what you have learned this morning.”