You Have Been Defended [EN]: Chapter 239

Dongjin spoke with a face that looked as if he would collapse at any moment.

While waiting for Dongjin, I was sure something had happened, but I also desperately hoped nothing had. His reaction, however, filled me with despair.

“Ha… First, sit here on the bench.”

“Where are you going?”

I pointed to the coffee vending machine. It seemed like this would be a long story, and we couldn’t just stand there in the cold.

As I handed him the coffee, Dongjin smiled faintly and thanked me.

“Now, tell me.”

Dongjin was trembling.

I wasn’t sure if it was the cold or his mental state. I stared at his trembling fingertips and impulsively offered him the leather gloves from my coat pocket.

“…It’s not because I’m cold.”

I hoped he was trembling because of the cold. I didn’t want to think his agitation was so great it made his hands tremble.

I hesitated for a moment and put the gloves back in my pocket.

“Didn’t you say the surgery went well? That day, December 31st of last year. The chief said the surgery was very successful and that the recovery would be good.”

“That’s right. The surgery went well. The recovery wasn’t bad either, and the patient woke up two days later.”

“So, it’s not that he didn’t wake up after the surgery, but that he woke up and then became a vegetable?”

Dongjin nodded heavily.

He was clearly struggling, but short answers wouldn’t give me the full picture, even if we talked for hours.

“Tell me everything from the beginning. You said the surgery was fine, so start from then.”

“Ha, okay.”

Dongjin frowned, pressing his temples as if trying to recall the events. After a long pause, he slowly began.

“During the recovery, the patient showed symptoms of meningitis. So, after doing a cerebrospinal fluid test [a test of the fluid surrounding the brain and spinal cord] and a serum test [a blood test], bacterial meningitis was suspected. Just in case, we did a bacterial culture and decided to administer an empirical antibiotic [an antibiotic given based on clinical judgment before lab results are available]. We checked carefully when using antibiotics. We knew that the patient had anaphylaxis [a severe, potentially life-threatening allergic reaction] to beta-lactam antibiotics, so the chief even instructed us to administer moxifloxacin instead of cephalosporin. Ah… I wonder if you can understand what I’m saying like this?”

“Yes, I understand roughly. Seol Hyeong-seok has an allergic reaction to some antibiotics, so you deliberately used something other than the commonly used ones.”

“That’s right. We proceeded very carefully, meticulously, so that nothing was missed. The bacterial culture results confirmed it was bacterial meningitis, and we continued treatment accordingly.”

“And then?”

“One day, I suddenly got a call from the hospital room. The patient was complaining of chest pain and his airways were swollen. I ran over there, and he was in shock.”

Dongjin closed his eyes tightly, holding his forehead as if the events were still vivid.

“The response was immediate. I intubated him [inserted a tube into his trachea to help him breathe] and performed CPR. I called the chief… Until then, I couldn’t understand why the patient suddenly went into shock. I think I did CPR for almost 20 minutes, taking turns. While I was doing CPR, the chief was checking the chart.”

“And then?”

“I was preparing to switch places next to the bed, but the chief suddenly came to me and started yelling like crazy. Why did you administer cephalosporin? Didn’t I tell you to administer moxifloxacin instead?”

“…Are you talking about that antibiotic from earlier? The one you switched to because he had anaphylaxis.”

Dongjin nodded.

He continued, his throat choked up. “I never ordered cephalosporin to be administered. Never! No, ha… I’ll talk about this later, and explain the situation first. Anyway, I thought it was because of the anaphylactic reaction, so I immediately injected epinephrine [a medication used to treat severe allergic reactions] into his thigh… I took action like that, but the patient suffered brain damage.”

“So, you’re saying he’s in a vegetative state now?”

“…Yeah.”

“And now you’re being blamed for Seol Hyeong-seok’s shock because you ordered cephalosporin to be administered, even though you never ordered it.”

“That’s right.”

I was speechless.

In my previous life, the surgery itself was the problem, so I thought we were in the clear this time. But even if the surgery goes well, problems arise.

Could someone be deliberately trying to put Dongjin in danger using Seol Hyeong-seok? Even after removing the chief who tried to force Dongjin to perform proxy surgery in his previous life?

“What did the nurse do? The nurse would have known that Seol Hyeong-seok had anaphylaxis. Why did she inject it according to the order?”

“That’s what’s ridiculous to me. I didn’t order that, but let’s say, for the sake of argument, that I did. Shouldn’t she check with me to make sure the order is correct? If she can’t check with me for some reason, she should ask someone else.”

“What does the nurse say?”

“She says she thought it was right to follow the doctor’s orders. She said that the doctor makes the final judgment and takes responsibility, so she thought she should follow the order even if it was wrong. She said she had been burned badly before for raising objections.”

I understood what the nurse was saying.

The power imbalance between nurses and doctors is a long-standing issue in the medical community. Nurses are sometimes penalized for questioning doctors, which is seen as ‘insubordination,’ even though the relationship isn’t supposed to be hierarchical.

However, no matter how much she has been burned, how can she follow a wrong order when the patient’s life is at stake?

“Witnesses. Besides that nurse, was there anyone else in the room when you told her to administer cephalosporin?”

“No one was there.”

“Are you sure?”

“I’m sure.”

“Ha… You really didn’t order that, did you?”

“Are you suspecting me too? I told you before that I didn’t!”

Dongjin shouted, perhaps because he was upset by my question.

But rather than being angry, I was relieved by the letters floating above his head.

[Truth]

“You know it’s not true either.”

I put my hand on Dongjin’s shoulder to calm him down.

As soon as he heard my answer, Dongjin flinched like a child caught playing a prank. He lowered his head and rubbed his face with his dry hands.

“…I’m sorry. Ha, I don’t know why I’m getting angry at you for no reason. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay. I asked to make sure. It’s not that I don’t trust you.”

“Thank you…”

“So. Keep talking. So what did you say?”

Dongjin rummaged through his pockets and asked if I had a cigarette.

I wanted to hear his answer as soon as possible, but I understood why he was struggling to speak.

As I handed Dongjin a cigarette, he put it in his mouth, lit it, and continued. “I said no, of course. I said I never gave such an order. I asked the nurse if she heard the order from me, and if she thought I, as the attending physician, couldn’t even remember that he had anaphylaxis.”

“Wait a minute. You’re the attending physician [the doctor primarily responsible for a patient’s care]?”

“Yeah. I thought it would go to the director’s son, but the chief said he would leave it to me, so I decided to take charge. And the patient felt a little close to me, so I thought it would be better for me to do some mind control [psychological support and reassurance] in the situation before the big surgery.”

“…So, what does the nurse say?”

“She says I’m misremembering. Maybe I was too busy and said to inject cephalosporin when I meant to say not to inject it. Anyway, she says she did as I said.”

“Is it recorded?”

Dongjin bit his lip and slowly nodded.

“It’s written on the chart that I told her to inject it. But, there’s no way I would have done that. Absolutely.”

“What do you think about this situation? Do you think there was a communication error?”

Dongjin didn’t answer right away and pondered for a moment.

“I think maybe the nurse is trying to put the blame on me for what she misheard. She must have been very scared because the patient is a VIP [very important person]. But now that nurse is creating an atmosphere that I’m trying to shift the responsibility to her.”

Since my ability is to distinguish between the truth and falsehoods that the speaker is thinking, perhaps Dongjin is misremembering, as the nurse said.

But there’s a way to check.

I can use my ability on the nurse too. If the nurse also gets a truth judgment, it means there was a communication error, whether Dongjin misspoke or the nurse misunderstood. If the nurse gets a false judgment, I can assume she’s blaming him to avoid responsibility, as Dongjin guessed.

Anyway, to do that, I have to meet the nurse.

“Does the patient’s family know about this situation?”

“They know. So, the attending physician has been changed for now… The patient’s family is now saying they’re going to sue me.”

“Not suing the nurse and you, but just you?”

“They seem to think it’s my fault. Of course, I think they’re putting pressure on the hospital to hold the nurse accountable for not raising objections and fire her, but…”

Any parents would be furious when their promising young son suddenly becomes a vegetable.

Holding the attending physician accountable rather than the nurse would be a more direct way to vent their anger.

I roughly understand how things are going.

As I watched Dongjin light his third cigarette without a word, a picture suddenly came to mind.

In my previous life, the former chief forced him to perform proxy surgery, leading to his downfall. But this incident happened even after removing that risk factor.

Does that mean the former chief wasn’t the real threat?

What if the person who ultimately kept trying to put Dongjin in danger was someone else? If the former chief was an accomplice, all these questions would be resolved.