Surgery Godfather

"Mr. John Ansen!" Morris tried to remain polite.

After having his professional abilities questioned by his daughters, now John Ansen was belittling him again, further wounding his pride.

"You can speak bluntly, why can't I do the same? Did I say something wrong? You can't let your pitiful pride make them lose such a precious opportunity. I can responsibly tell you that Professor Yang is the only doctor in the world who can perform the surgery for them." John Ansen was neither in a hurry nor afraid of Morris getting angry.

The stronger someone's pride, the more it needs to be pierced. Otherwise, pride is like a fog that blinds him, controlling him instead of allowing him to follow objective facts.

"In the field of neurosurgery, in what aspect do you surpass me? Brainstem tumors? In the fields you consider yourself strong, whether in terms of surgery volume or success rates, you lag far behind me. Isn't it laughable that a neurosurgeon of such low caliber can act as a judge over an excellent one? Do you think his scores and judgments would be correct?" John Ansen continued.

"Mr. John Ansen! Don't insult me. I admit I'm not as good as you, but that's no reason to insult me."

"This is not an insult; it is stating objective facts. If you feel insulted, that's your problem, not mine. I can't control that, nor will I try. I'm merely giving you advice from a medical perspective, and the final decision is yours."

"Yes, you are right. So now leave. My personal affairs are not for you to discuss."

"I'm sorry. I'm not here as a friend to discuss personal matters. If I were, I wouldn't bother with your affairs. I'm here as a member of the medical team. As a doctor, I'm having an in-depth face-to-face communication with you as a family member of the patient. Do you think I came all the way to China just for a failed surgery? I'm here to learn from this case. At Professor Yang's, I haven't witnessed a failed case. He can handle surgeries far more difficult than this. Morris, compared to him, you and your colleagues in neurosurgery are like students compared to a doctor in terms of knowledge."

"I don't want to listen now; you're making me unhappy." Morris was already angry.

"Because I've pricked your pitiful pride. You always thought you were so great, but now you suddenly find you are nothing. Think it over yourself, bye."

John Ansen was about to open the door to leave the meeting room, but he remembered a Chinese story.

"Morris, let me say a few more words and tell you a story. A beggar who has never seen an emperor doesn't know what the emperor's life is like, so he imagines with all his might—the emperor must have a truly extraordinary life, surely eating dozens of steaming hot bread every day."

After speaking, John Ansen opened the door and left, leaving Morris alone in thought.

---

In the doctors' office, Yang Ping was staring dazedly at the electronic screen designated for viewing images, with several students sitting beside him.

Although Yang Ping was already very familiar with the surgery for the conjoined twins, he was still willing to spend extra time researching it.

For example, the separation of the chest and abdomen, spinal correction, and reconstruction of the vascular system—these are challenges not found in simpler cases of conjoined twins. Conjoined twins are rare in the world, and few can undergo surgery. Such complex surgeries are rare among the rare, so there is no established procedure to follow.

However, any surgery is ultimately an application of basic surgical principles. It doesn't depart from the three fundamental stages of resection, repair, and reconstruction.

Therefore, Yang Ping is never bewildered by any unprecedented surgery, because he has reached a higher level, starting from first principles, using the most basic medical and surgical principles to understand and plan surgeries, rather than staying at the level of ordinary surgeons.

This is akin to the difference in understanding mathematics between a master and an ordinary person; they are not at the same level.

He intends not only to separate these two sisters but also to rectify their deformed spine. Their head, neck, chest, and abdomen are connected from top to bottom, causing spinal deformities. Spinal correction requires high skill. Although Song Zimo can perform spinal correction surgery, he would also provide some guidance.

As for the skin and some muscle defects resulting from the separation, it's not a problem at Sanbo Hospital, because that's the forte of the Stem Cell Laboratory. They can use skin expansion technology to obtain large amounts of complete patches of skin, and muscle defects are not an issue. The stem cell experiments boast of advanced muscle cultivation technology. The first spatial orientation gene they possess is a muscle orientation gene, the technology for which Yang Ping won the Nobel Prize. Using these muscles, the laboratory can cultivate muscles for any part of the human body.

Once these two issues are addressed, Yang Ping won't fear the skin and muscle defects post-separation, regardless of their extent, as skin grafts and muscle grafts can resolve any such defects, and autologous grafts will have no rejection reaction.

Without worrying about defects, many problems can be addressed more drastically. If the family agrees to the surgery, Yang Ping is prepared to give the world's surgeons a classic lesson on how to tackle an unprecedented complex surgery.

"Professor!"

John Ansen approached Yang Ping quietly.

"If their parents agree to the surgery, not only will I separate them, but I will also complete their spinal correction and through reconstructive surgery cover all skin and muscle defects, allowing them to live completely like normal individuals."

Yang Ping concluded his repeated internal planning and spoke to John Ansen.

"Spinal correction too? Can skin and muscle defects be repaired through grafts?"

John Ansen had initially thought it was merely separation, as even separation was a devilish challenge. When he was in the United States, he and other doctors never considered spine correction. For deficient skin and muscle, they only considered using grafts for wound coverage, never contemplating muscle transplants. After all, where would so much muscle come from? It seemed impossible.

Spinal correction, John Ansen could understand, given that the professor's original field was orthopedics, and he had earned a reputation in the medical community for spinal correction.

But how to fill muscle deficits, and where to find so much muscle? Harvesting all viable donor muscles from the entire body would still be insufficient.

"Professor! Where do we get the muscle from?" John Ansen asked.

Yang Ping glanced at him: "Cultivated from the Stem Cell Laboratory. We've been cultivating it, and by now, we should have attained a certain volume of muscle."

"The laboratory can cultivate it?"

"Of course, the practical application of the Spatial Orientation Gene Theory currently lies in muscle cloning."

John Ansen suddenly remembered that the professor had won the Nobel Prize not for surgical technology, but for basic medical research: using the Spatial Orientation Gene Theory he discovered to clone muscle in a laboratory setting. Indeed, he had overlooked that the professor was a versatile expert, always focusing on surgical operations while forgetting that his true focus was now on research.

"Understood, I almost forgot. Sanbo Hospital has a Stem Cell Laboratory capable of cultivating large amounts of muscle."

A light went off in John Ansen's mind. For the stubborn Morris, he should take him on a tour of the laboratory to let him see the power of Chinese research.

"Professor, could I take Morris to visit the laboratory upstairs? I just want to show him our research capacity, to broaden that country bumpkin's horizons a bit," John Ansen requested.

Yang Ping roughly guessed that his communication with Morris had some difficulty, which was expected. Americans are generally arrogant, and arrogance easily leads to prejudice. The combination of arrogance and prejudice is the biggest barrier to communication.

Actually, whether Morris agrees to the surgery or not doesn't concern Yang Ping much. If he agrees, Yang Ping will go all out to do the surgery well. If not, then no matter. He can find another expert and discharge them back to the United States. The matter isn't complicated.

"No problem, take him to see," Yang Ping agreed.

Since it was a restricted research area, where idlers were not allowed, John Ansen sought permission from Professor Yang, not expecting him to be so open-minded.