Chapter 10: Artificial Respiration

Lu Feng stopped a passerby and asked, “What happened over there?”
“There was a car crash. A BMW ended up under a bus, the whole bus overturned, and lots of people got hurt. The ambulance just arrived. What a tragedy…”

His father always said that a healer must have a heart like a parent’s—turning a blind eye to suffering is a disgrace to the medical profession.

When Lu Feng heard it was a car accident, he hurried over to see if he could help.

…

At the intersection of Tangde Avenue and Yinhe Road, the accident scene was catastrophic.

Bus number 22 had been turning left when a BMW sped straight toward it, sliding under the bus. The bus’s left front wheel rode up onto the BMW’s roof, and with the centrifugal force of the turn, the entire bus tipped onto its right side, skidding more than ten meters across the ground.

There were many passengers on the bus—men and women, young and old. Over a dozen were seriously injured, with even more suffering minor wounds.

The siren Lu Feng had heard was from the first ambulance to arrive. Emergency workers were already tending to the wounded.

A young woman, her face covered in blood, clutched a little girl of four or five and cried out desperately, “Someone, please help my daughter! I beg you… save my little girl…”

There were simply too many casualties for the emergency workers to manage. The young woman’s heart-wrenching cries went unanswered for the moment.

A young man in a leather jacket, his hair slicked back, led a bespectacled companion into the scene. Approaching the desperate mother, he said, “Let me take a look.”

“Are you a doctor?” she asked anxiously.

“I’m a medical student,” the young man replied.

Upon hearing he was from the medical university, the mother grabbed his jacket with blood-stained hands and pleaded, “Please save my daughter! Please, she’s only five!”

He wrinkled his nose in disgust at the stains on his leather jacket, shook off her grip, and then beckoned to his friend, “Get your phone out and film this.”

The bespectacled student obediently took out his phone and began recording.

The young man laid the little girl flat on the ground, then looked up and snapped, “What are you filming? Film me! Close-up on my face, understand?”

His friend was confused. “Aren’t you filming for evidence, so she can’t blame you later?”

“You’re an idiot. This isn’t my fault—it’s a massive accident, how could she blame me? Film me doing the rescue, upload it online, and if my dad’s in a good mood, there’ll be some reward in it for me,” the young man said.

“Right, right…” The friend finally understood and began focusing on filming the rescue.

The mother overheard their conversation and felt uneasy. But saving her daughter was all that mattered; she didn’t care if their intentions were pure, so long as her child could be saved.

“I beg you, please save my daughter,” she pleaded, her voice breaking.

“Enough, I’m starting the rescue, so be quiet!” the young man ordered, then began checking the girl’s injuries.

He gave a cursory check for breathing and a pulse, then announced, “She’s in shock—she needs mouth-to-mouth and CPR. Move aside.” With that, he placed his hands on the little girl’s chest, ready to begin compressions.

…

Ding Xiang was a resident physician at the First Hospital of Yangcheng. She had passed her exams after just one year of internship, an outstanding achievement. She had come with the ambulance in response to the emergency.

She had just performed a cricothyrotomy on a patient struggling to breathe, relieving the obstruction, and instructed the crew to get the patient onto a stretcher.

She’d heard a woman calling for help for her daughter earlier but had been too focused on her procedure to look back. Now, turning around, she saw a slick-haired young man about to perform chest compressions on the little girl.

To Ding Xiang, his rescue technique was appalling—he hadn’t even unbuttoned the girl’s shirt for an open airway, nor checked her thoroughly for injuries.

She was about to stop him when a hand reached from behind, grabbed the young man’s collar, and tossed him aside.

Immediately, a teenager in sportswear squatted down, pried open the little girl’s eyelids, then deftly began unbuttoning her shirt.

The slick-haired student landed face-first on the ground, the whole incident captured on his friend’s phone. Furious, he scrambled up and shouted at his assailant, “What the hell are you doing? Are you looking to die? This is my patient—touch her again and I’ll have someone deal with you!”

Lu Feng ignored the outburst. Having unbuttoned the girl’s shirt, he bent down and listened to her heartbeat, then ran his fingers carefully over her body, checking for broken bones or other injuries.

The young mother, seeing this unfamiliar youth examining her daughter so thoroughly, grew even more anxious and suspicious. “What are you doing? Are you a doctor?” she demanded.

“Yes,” Lu Feng replied with calm seriousness.

The slick-haired student was momentarily stunned, then pointed at Lu Feng in anger. “You’re just a kid—how could you be a doctor? Do you know how many years it takes to become a doctor? At least five years of university, a year of internship before you’re even eligible to sit for the resident exam, and barely ten people pass each year. Some try for over a decade and still don’t make it. Who are you kidding?”

The mother grew frantic as well; after all, Lu Feng looked so young. Clutching his wrist with trembling hands, she sobbed, “My daughter isn’t even five—she can’t die. If you’re not a doctor, please don’t delay her treatment…”

Lu Feng understood the desperation of patients’ families—he had seen it countless times while treating villagers in the foothills of Yunshan. When a child fell gravely ill, their parents’ cries were always heart-rending.

He didn’t blame the mother for interfering. Instead, he continued treating the girl, asking gently, “What’s her name?”

“We call her Xiaoxiao,” the mother replied quickly.

“Xiaoxiao, can you hear me? If you can, try to take a deep breath,” Lu Feng called out. But after repeating himself twice with no response, he could confirm she was completely unconscious.

The slick-haired student, enraged, stormed over to kick Lu Feng away.

Lu Feng said coldly, “If you don’t want a broken leg, get out of my way.”

“You’ve got some nerve! I’m a medical student—who the hell are you? This girl is in shock. If you don’t immediately start mouth-to-mouth and CPR, she’ll suffer brain damage from lack of oxygen,” the student recited, as if from a textbook—basic knowledge for any medical student.

“Her ribs are broken. Chest compressions will drive the broken bones into her lungs,” Lu Feng replied flatly.

Blunt force trauma is common in car accidents, and fractures are a frequent complication.

“What…” The student was dumbstruck. He hadn’t thought to check the ribs. But then he rallied and retorted loudly, “Don’t talk nonsense! Our professors say that if a patient’s heart has stopped, you have to give it your all during CPR. Broken ribs are a minor issue—what matters is getting the heart beating again. Even a punctured lung is a small price to pay.”

His bespectacled companion, also a medical student, chimed in, “Yeah, these days doctors are too scared to do proper CPR because of all the lawsuits and fake news. At our university hospital, there’s this huge black guy—every time he helps out in a resuscitation, the patient’s heart starts again. He just uses brute force—broken ribs are normal.”

The slick-haired student continued, “When we practice CPR on mannequins at school, sometimes you have to put your whole weight on them just to light up the ‘pass’ indicator. Never mind broken ribs—if you’re doing it right, you’ll break them most of the time.”

Lu Feng knew a thing or two about CPR. While these two had exaggerated somewhat, what they said was essentially true.

CPR is only performed when the heart has already stopped and the patient is on the brink of death. If it can save a life, a few broken ribs are a small price to pay.

But the side effects of CPR are significant—many complications can result, pneumothorax being just one.

“You’re both right, but you haven’t considered that she’s just a five-year-old child. Pediatric CPR uses one hand, not both. If you use your full strength, what hope does she have?” Lu Feng responded.

Ding Xiang had noticed earlier that the slick-haired student hadn’t even unbuttoned the girl’s shirt before starting compressions—she could tell at a glance he was only half-trained. She’d wanted to intervene, but Lu Feng had beaten her to it.

She watched as Lu Feng examined the child with practiced hands, while all around them the chaos of the accident continued…