Fly on the wall

I've had my share of hospital stays in the United States. Much of daily life in a hospital can be summed up as "hurry up and wait". It is very much the same here in Nanshan except for a cultural twist.

The department of rehabilitation at the hospital is quite large and has the reputation of being the best in the area in terms of specialized equipment and medical personnel. As a result, there are many outpatients who are treated here daily on a first come first serve basis. Factor in the twenty of so patients in the Stem Cell Ward and other patients in the hospital and you have a scheduling problem that rivals chaos theory. And yet, to my amazement, we never had to wait for more than 5 to 10 minutes for Richard's daily appointment.

Richard's PT, OT and acupuncture treatments are performed in three separate areas. The acupuncture and Chinese massage (Tui Na) area has around ten narrow cots laid out in close proximity to each other. Each cot can be curtained off from the rest of the room. Almost every patient that I've seen in the last three days is accompanied by one or more companions. You do the math. Twenty people plus up to five therapists coexist in the same room. There is absolutely no privacy. You can hear every word that's spoken. The privacy curtains are rarely used. Despite all this, there is almost a spa-like atmosphere to the place. It felt cozy rather than claustrophobic. Total strangers banter back and forth. The foreign patients used the time to catch up with each other. Though I must admit that the locals love to stare openly at the foreigners in the room. For a while, I had the dubious distinction of being the star attraction:

Richard and my entrance to the room barely caused a ripple of interest since we blend in with the locals. I then address Dr. Lee in Chinese to let him know that Richard is ready for his treatment. So far so good. As Richard settles into his cot, Dr. Lee comes over to apply the needles. I start to wander off to chat with the other patients and caregivers from our floor. The first time I did this, heads swivelled. After a while, I noticed that some people from the next room which is the PT gym area started to migrate over to stare at me through the open partition between the two rooms. Good lord, she looks Chinese, she speaks Chinese but she's really a lao why (foreigner in Chinese, but it mostly refers to Caucasians)!

The OT room is run by an all female staff. Dr. Ye and her staff share a soft spot for the children under their care. I asked Dr. Ye about the incidence of autism in China. She told me that she has seem her share at the hospital. Her heart goes out to the parents of these children. She showed me a photo of a young, autistic Australian boy who she's treated. He was a little over one year old when his parents brought him to Nanshan.

Nanshan (or Shenzhen People's Hospital Number 6 as it is officially known) is a teaching hospital. On a regular day, there are quite a few interns getting their hands-on experience in the rehab department. They work under the watchful eye of the doctors. There are two Dr. Lees in rehab. "Big Dr. Lee" is the supervisor of acupuncture, Chinese massage and PT. He got his moniker since he is larger in physique (taller) than "small Dr. Lee" who coincidentally came from the same city as Richard's parents. Big Dr. Lee is often frustrated by the antics of some of his interns. The young 'uns apparently tend to bite off more than they can chew in order to one-up each other. When one of them tried to emulate the way that Dr. Wang, another doctor in the PT department, threw the ball to Richard the previous day, Richard started to keel backward. Luckily, big Dr. Lee was watching through the open partition. He started to yell at the intern to quit showing off and to stick to the basics like making sure that the patient does not fall down.

In the spirit of what's good for the goose is good for the gander, I decided to seek Dr. Lee's help in getting rid of my chronic neck, shoulder and back pain. He prescribed heat treatment, the electric stimulation machine and Chinese massage and kindly squeezed me in as the last patient of the day. As a result, I not only got effective pain relief but also a telling glimpse of the closeness between the interns and the doctors.

I was lying on my cot in the empty acupuncture room waiting for my muscle stimulation machine to finish the program when in came three interns. It was five thirty-three in the afternoon, a little past quitting time. It has been a long day for the interns. A female intern pleaded with a male intern for massage relief on her sore neck. He replied that he can do better than that --- he was going to do his "famous" neck adjustment for her. She protested vehemently that he had not gotten the doctor's approval to perform the delicate maneuver. The young man waved off her objections and started to massage her neck a little too roughly. The girl squealed and told him to be more gentle.

Meanwhile, the other male intern wandered over to fan the flames. He said that he does the neck adjustment better than anyone else and he'd be willing to do it. Just as the girl was starting to panic, little Dr. Lee walked in and asked what was going on. He listened with an expression of mock gravity and went over to the girl. He then put his hand on her neck and carefully performed the adjustment. The interns watched in a respectful silence that was broken when another female intern rushed in to ask the doctor for permission to leave for the day. I have a feeling that all these interns are going to make fine doctors one day. Yes, I would even ask any one of them for a neck adjustment.