The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim

It wasn’t strange for Hwang Sang-hoon to bring up inpatient rooms.

In the rare cases where Korean medicine clinics use more than two floors, one floor is usually dedicated to inpatient rooms.

I had considered the idea myself.

Patients occasionally appear who make me want to just admit them and keep a close eye on them.

Some have conditions serious enough to require hospitalization, while others can’t control external factors like alcohol consumption with outpatient treatment.

Moreover, Sowon General Hospital, with which we have an MOU, sometimes asks if they can refer patients with post-surgery complications or chemotherapy side effects.

At times like these, I feel the need for inpatient rooms… but…

‘Realistically, maintaining inpatient rooms just for that is unfeasible.’

In Murim, or more precisely in the Tang family’s medical pavilion, it was easy.

I lived near the pavilion used as an inpatient ward, and disciples were always on standby.

I didn’t have to spend a penny of my own money on night shifts, you see?

But honestly, it’s impossible to hire full-time nurses for night shifts just for the occasional one or two patients who need hospitalization.

To break even, you’d need to create at least 10 beds in the inpatient ward and keep them all filled.

Most Korean medicine clinics that operate inpatient facilities adopt one of two approaches.

They either partner with Western medicine hospitals to receive many patients with post-surgery complications, or they admit patients with minor injuries from traffic accidents.

There are rare, exceptional clinics that specialize in atopic dermatitis patients who need intensive dietary management, but they probably number less than ten nationwide.

It’s different from Korean medicine hospitals.

Of course, many Korean medicine hospitals also structure their revenue around minor ailments, but they have options. If they want, they can operate in the way they prefer.

Even the patients I met at my alma mater’s Korean medicine hospital had quite diverse conditions.

There was a tinnitus patient I encountered by chance and treated.

Many patients were admitted after collapsing from stroke, or jungpung as we call it.

Many people were receiving necessary treatments, such as those who had difficulty getting up due to lumbar disc herniation, patients who lost consciousness in motorcycle accidents, and patients going back and forth between Western and Korean medicine hospitals while undergoing chemotherapy.

This is possible because it’s a hospital-level facility.

They can hire doctors and have all the necessary medications and facilities to prepare for emergencies.

Having just one nurse on night duty isn’t enough to handle critical accidents.

Then we’d have to only admit patients with minor injuries that don’t need emergency care… but I don’t want to do that.

“I’m not going to do a clinic with inpatient rooms. If I’m going to do it, I should open a proper Korean medicine hospital.”

There’s no need to explain in detail why I won’t do it.

Even among Korean medicine doctors, the image of clinics with inpatient rooms isn’t very good.

Some people are eroding the industry by indiscriminately admitting minor traffic accident patients and damaging the public’s trust in Korean medicine clinics.

Yet Hwang Sang-hoon looked very surprised.

“Are you thinking of opening a Korean medicine hospital?”

Ah, so that’s what it was.

“Of course not right now.”

I spent all my assets buying the building and even took on additional debt.

I heard it takes at least 2 to 3 billion won to open even a small Korean medicine hospital, so where would that capital come from?

It will take quite a while just to stabilize the external decoction room I’m about to start.

But despite my denial, Hwang Sang-hoon didn’t relax his serious expression.

“What’s wrong? Afraid we’ll become rivals with your family’s Hwangje Korean Medicine Hospital?”

“No, no! I absolutely don’t think that. Now that I’ve left home, I don’t really consider myself connected to that place anymore.”

It was a joke, but he waved his hands in great embarrassment.

“What’s most important is that you do whatever you want and succeed at it!”

“Hmm.”

I thought for a moment.

Hwang Sang-hoon now claims he has no connection to Hwangje Korean Medicine Hospital, but blood ties aren’t so easily severed.

And even if he really cuts off all contact in the future, he must have seen and learned things there.

“Why don’t you open a Korean medicine hospital when you become independent later?”

“Huh…? Me?”

“Yeah. Like how Director Chu devoured the Haneul Korean Medicine Clinic in Daegu, you could swallow up Hwangje Korean Medicine Hospital.”

“Ahahaha.”

Hwang Sang-hoon laughed.

This time I was actually serious, but he seemed to think it was a joke.

“That would be interesting.”

“Well, if you ever want to become independent later, that’s the idea~ For now, you need to keep working hard as our Deputy Director.”

We’ll worry about future matters when the time comes.

For now, the question is how to use the newly acquired space.

I shared my interior design plans with Hwang Sang-hoon.

“When the academy moves out of the third floor, I’ll move my consultation room downstairs. We can fit about 20 treatment beds since I do acupuncture quickly.”

The clinic currently has only 10 beds. On days when Hwang Sang-hoon and I work together, all patients share those.

No matter how quickly I can insert 100 needles in a minute, it still takes about 20 minutes for the needles to take effect, and there’s loss of time when proceeding with physical therapy, cupping, and moxibustion.

When all beds are full, patients have to wait in the waiting room.

“Ah. So you’ll use the entire third floor alone, and I and the new person we hire will do consultations and treatments on the fourth floor?”

“It would be complicated to do consultations here and go downstairs for acupuncture. Ah, on days when I’m off and the new person works with you, they should use the consultation room on the third floor, right?”

“I understand.”

Hwang Sang-hoon nodded.

“While we’re at it, I’ll move the examination room downstairs and add a few more machines. We get a lot of patients with autonomic nervous system imbalances, so I’m thinking of buying a heart rate variability (HRV) machine and an EEG.”

We’ve given it the grand name of ‘examination room,’ but originally it just had a blood pressure monitor and an InBody machine. We added the ultrasound that Hwang Sang-hoon bought.

But thanks to Hyun Joo-mi’s promotion, we’ve been getting more patients in the psychiatric field, so I’ve been feeling the need for additional examination equipment.

“I’ll buy another ultrasound machine for downstairs, so you should take the current one to your consultation room.”

Kim Chun-sik in Seoul recently introduced ultrasound too, and he’s scanning all patients with it in his consultation room.

Once we get used to it, that system might be better than our current method of examining only when necessary.

“Alright. It’s going to be a major change.”

“You just keep taking good care of patients like you’ve been doing! Fighting!”

I high-fived Hwang Sang-hoon.

Of course, he raised his right arm and clapped hands energetically.

But for some reason, he looked disappointed.

Hmm, did I make too many decisions on my own?

“It’ll be nice to have the director on a different floor, right?”

“…I’ll miss it.”

I tried another joke to lighten the mood.

Hwang Sang-hoon smiled but shook his head.

◆◇◆◇◆

I explained the future plans not only to Hwang Sang-hoon but also to the employees.

“So we’ll take a break while the new interior work is being done?”

“Of course not. We’ll do business on the fourth floor while renovating the third, and then use the third floor while fixing the fourth.”

“Ah~!”

The interior work will be done by contractors if we just pay, and we decided to go with the company Seo In-ae recommended for contractor selection.

Now the important thing is how to set up the external decoction room on the second floor.

The work done in an external decoction room is essentially the process of bringing in medicinal herbs, decocting them into medicine, and sending it to patients.

The most important part is where and how to bring in good medicinal herbs.

It all requires human eyes and hands, from storing them cleanly to decocting them accurately.

Until we find someone to entrust this to, I’ll have to do it myself for now.

Although I even met with professors last time asking them to introduce suitable candidates, there’s been no news from that end, and instead, we got the space first.

So for the time being, I’ll cover the manpower, and what’s left is the medicinal herbs.

“Seon-yun-nim, do you have a moment to talk?”

“Director, have you been well? What can I do for you?”

I had one route prepared for this.

Until now, we’ve been dealing with ordinary pharmaceutical companies, but as the decoction volume increases, there’s a need to make new wholesale contracts.

To use the highest quality medicinal herbs while prescribing at appropriate prices for patients, we needed to reduce the costs that go into intermediate distribution as much as possible.

I asked Park Seon-yun to help with communication with the company that supplies medicinal herbs from China, which I had mentioned before.

“Ah, that matter! I actually have a meeting scheduled soon regarding that. We can visit together in the near future!”

Park Seon-yun gladly kept his promise.

A single phone call would have been enough, but he willingly offered to accompany me.

Wow, it’s reassuring to have a big company director by my side!

◆◇◆◇◆

A few days later.

I visited the Korean branch of a medicinal herb export company headquartered in Henan Province, along with Park Seon-yun.

“We didn’t expect Director Park from PK to visit in person.”

“Branch Manager Liu Wei says he didn’t expect Director Park from PK to visit in person.”

Perhaps because it’s a Chinese company, the branch manager seemed to be Chinese.

He warmly welcomed Park Seon-yun’s visit, even bringing an interpreter.

Wow~ It’s kind of nice to hear Chinese after so long!

When I first fell into Murim without an automatic translation system, I thought I was going crazy trying to get used to it.

“It’s an honor to meet you. I hope our two companies will continue to cooperate closely and develop together.”

But didn’t he just say he didn’t expect him to come in person?

The original meeting that was mentioned… probably did exist, but did he take over a subordinate’s work?

“Is there any part of the contract terms you’d like to adjust?”

“Ah, not at all! I wanted to introduce someone while also taking a look at the site.”

Park Seon-yun immediately introduced me to the branch manager.

“This is a Korean medicine doctor I’ve become close with after she treated me. She’s preparing to open an external decoction room, so I brought her to ask if you could supply herbs under similar conditions.”

This could be an excessive request.

PK supplies products to pharmacies and convenience stores nationwide, so the volume of medicinal herbs they import is truly enormous.

It would be unreasonable to ask for the same conditions for me, who would at most be responsible for decoctions for three branches so far.

“Ah!”

But the branch manager smiled brightly.

He had been quite worried about problems arising with the PK contract, but my matter turned out to be a light favor in comparison.

“If it’s someone Director Park is introducing, of course we should do that. We’ll supply the highest quality herbs. But…”

“We’ll keep it strictly confidential. Please don’t worry unnecessarily, Branch Manager.”

“Oh, you’re fluent in Chinese as well?”

“I briefly stayed at… I mean, observed at a Chinese medicine university hospital.”

“Ah, I see! You must have studied through historical dramas? Your accent is unique.”

Huh? Hmm? I thought I was speaking in normal modern language…?

Did it show in the intonation?

“Haha, I, I do like historical dramas a bit.”

“Let’s take a look around. I’ll guide you.”

The branch manager smiled gently and personally guided us to the herb storage area.

He seemed to have a thorough grasp of the practical aspects, explaining in detail where each herb was grown and how it was stored.

‘The Angelica sinensis is definitely top quality. The Liriope platyphylla is good too…’

Most herbs would be fine to bring in from here.

Astragalus is a bit tricky, should I stick with the original supplier even if it’s more expensive?

I nodded while recording the condition and characteristics of each herb.

“No, I’m asking to see them in a state where I can check the vertical length. How can I tell if it’s 1-year, 3-year, or 5-year root when you show it like this?”

But as we finished our round and came out, I heard someone’s voice complaining in front of the herb storage area.

“These are 5-year roots. We only handle 5-year Astragalus roots.”

“The effect was exactly like 1-year roots? Since the thickness is all similar, I can’t tell. Please show me in their original state.”

“We check at the source before bringing them in. They’re all sliced, so we can’t show you the original form.”

“At least show me everything in the warehouse!”

It was a woman with her hair tied tightly in a ponytail, wearing an oversized gray T-shirt.

Her eyes looked strangely large, probably due to very high-prescription glasses.

‘She could tell if Astragalus was 1-year or 5-year root? Without being able to see the thickness?’

I turned my head towards her.

I can sense the energy contained in medicinal herbs, so with a lot of concentration, I can discern the quality of products.

But… how on earth did that person do it?

“Who is that woman?”

“I apologize. She’s an employee from a Korean medicine pharmacy we deal with, making unreasonable demands. We’ll send her away quickly.”

“Handle it quickly since we have important guests.”

The branch manager smiled brightly.

“It seems there’s a small disturbance. Please don’t mind it.”

But I couldn’t miss this opportunity.

After quickly excusing myself to the branch manager and Park Seon-yun, I rushed over to the protesting woman.