Securing the Airway Is Important (1)

8:00 a.m.

The alarm didn't wake me.

To put it simply, I woke up to the sound of every muscle in my body screaming.

I was still exactly as I had collapsed into bed last night, clothes and all.

When I hauled my creaking body upright, my shoulders and lower back popped with the sound of my joints resetting.

“Gaaah… I’m so stiff….”

I got up like a zombie and headed to the kitchen.

I pressed the coffee pot’s button and took the biggest mug out of the cabinet.

On a day like today, I needed to slug down espresso like I was drinking poison, not an Americano.

Only then did it feel like I’d actually wake up.

The sky outside was dazzlingly clear. It was the kind of weather you could call the perfect holiday morning.

Of course, that didn’t apply to me.

While the coffee brewed, I sat on the sofa and, as usual, opened the blue window in front of me.

Judging by how I still couldn’t quit this damn gallery even after putting up with yesterday’s crap on the way home from work, I guess I’m pretty hooked too.

So I suppressed my exhaustion as much as I could and posted a new thread with a morning greeting.

Title: A strong and mighty morning! Nice to see you, gallery folks.

Author: HellJoseonSlave1

Yeah, today I wasn’t going to be dragged around by those bastards.

Today I’d be the one in control of the conversation with these ghosts.

But my ambitious plan was shattered by the very first comment.

ScalpelGod: Oh, welcome.

The greeting was short and simple. But the sentence that followed was the problem.

What came next was practically a death sentence for my entire day off.

ScalpelGod: Hey, Hellslave, you ran off and fell asleep last night claiming you were tired, didn’t you? No running away ㅇㅇ. I’ll continue yesterday’s interrupted street emergency medicine lecture now. The topic is airway management. Don’t even think about escaping.

…?

I couldn’t believe my eyes. What? Continue from now? Continue what?

What the hell is this lunatic babbling about now?

These crazy bastards were going to ruin my day off again.

I hurriedly started pounding away at the keyboard—or rather, at my thoughts.

Was 'tapping' really the right word?

Anyway.

HellJoseonSlave1: No, you guys. Today is my off day. My holiday. My day off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ㄴ BackInMyDay: What do you mean, a doctor has a day off?

ㄴ ㅇㅇ(211.36): Mhm~~ We just wait until you show up~~

ㄴ ScalpelGod: I’m not hearing any objections. Let’s begin now.

What a load of crap.

I began my last-ditch struggle.

This wasn’t just whining that I didn’t want to do it; it was a perfectly realistic objection.

HellJoseonSlave1: No, how are we supposed to practice airway management in the first place!!! Are you telling me to jam a tube down my own throat right now?

At my desperate cry, the ghosts fell silent for a moment.

And then the completely idiotic comments, too stupid to seem human, began pouring in.

ㅇㅇ(211.36): Dunno?

BackInMyDay: Tsk tsk, you weak-willed bastard. That’s something you need to figure out on your own now.

Am I crazy? Do I willingly study something I don’t even want to learn?

Hippocrates' Descendant: Hmm… how about getting a pig lung and practicing inserting a tube into that?

And where the hell am I supposed to get a pig lung, you lunatic?

Am I supposed to go to a snack bar that sells soondae or something?

The most realistic suggestion, at least, came from a passing anonymous user.

ㅇㅇ(118.235): That’s true. You need at least a mannequin to practice the procedure on. Hey, doesn’t your hospital ER have a simulation room? There should be an intubation mannequin there. Borrow that and use it.

Simulation room.

Of course there was one. A training room for med students, EMTs, nurses, and residents, equipped with all sorts of expensive gear. But that place...

ㄴ HellJoseonSlave1: You think a mere first-year can just say, 'I want to practice~,' and use that place however I want on my day off?

ㄴ HellJoseonSlave1: That’s a place you schedule in advance and use under supervision, you guys with zero sense of reality!

My scream sent the gallery into silence once again.

Fine, let’s form a plausible hypothesis for why these lunatics were acting like this.

These damn ghosts were dead. Dead, and therefore they’d forgotten all the realistic constraints of that shitty system called a hospital.

So my rational conclusion was that all that was left for these ghost bastards was pure medical knowledge and the twisted desire to teach it.

Phew….

I stared blankly at the steam rising from the coffee pot.

In the end, I was isolated on the living room sofa on my precious holiday morning, saddled with the most useless assignment in the world: 'How to intubate a nonexistent mannequin.'

Fuck, what am I supposed to do about this, really?

Those crazy ghost bastards seemed to think I was some manga character who pulls out an all-purpose tool whenever someone asks for help.

If I shout, 'Intubation mannequin!' is one going to pop out of my pocket or what?

***

After a long silence, I was the first to give up.

If I kept holding out like this, those ghost bastards would just keep spouting endless sophistry about the importance of airway management until my day off ended.

Rather than listen to that bullshit, it’d be better to pretend to cooperate and get this over with quickly.

Reluctantly, I opened my laptop. I typed 'medical simulation mannequin' into the search bar. Countless shopping links flooded the screen. The price range was all over the place.

I uploaded the image of the cheapest CPR dummy and posted it to the gallery.

HellJoseonSlave1: How about this? 480,000 won. At this price, I can at least practice squeezing an Ambu bag, right?

OperatingRoomGhost3: What is this, some newly released kids’ toy?

BackInMyDay: That’s something you’d use for reservist training or something, not you. You think you can practice saving lives with that? Not a chance.

ㅇㅇ(211.36): What are you trying to do with that! It’s just a rubber doll with holes punched in it! To practice intubation, at the very least it needs to have the vocal cords and epiglottis modeled! With that, all you can do is practice bagging with an Ambu bag!

Fuck. Your standards are insanely high.

With a face like I was swallowing bitter medicine, I scrolled down and found a much more expensive professional model to show them.

'Anatomically similar to a real human, endotracheal intubation possible.'

The price was 2.3 million won.

HellJoseonSlave1: Then what about this? This is a model specifically for airway intubation.

ㄴ ScalpelGod: Ahem, at the very least, cricothyrotomy

(* cricothyrotomy, a surgical procedure used to secure the airway by cutting through the cricothyroid membrane when intubation is impossible)

it ought to be a model that can at least do that.

ㄴ HellJoseonSlave1: No, that’s a surgical procedure. Do I really need to practice cutting someone’s neck open right now?

ㄴ ScalpelGod: If intubation fails several times, what comes next? An incision, immediately. In an emergency, are you going to let the patient die saying, 'I mainly practiced internal medicine, so I can’t cut throats'? It’s a procedure an emergency medicine doctor should naturally know how to do.

These bastards, seriously.

It’s not that I don’t know that—it’s that my money would be wasted, my money. You motherfuckers.

Judging by these ghosts’ reactions, they must’ve been buried with plenty of cash for the afterlife. Why don’t they give me some of that?

In any case, what made it even more fucking annoying was the fact that I couldn’t refute any of it.

Because the fact was, practice making incisions was necessary too.

With trembling hands, I added the 'cricothyrotomy possible' option and searched again.

The mannequin price that appeared on screen made me doubt my eyes. 8.9 million won. A price that was almost 10 million won. These insane ghost bastards.

When I just stared at the screen with a hollow expression and didn’t reply, the ghosts started arguing among themselves.

BackInMyDay: Tsk tsk, young people these days only blame the equipment. Back in our day, we’d get even a pig’s neck and practice by cutting it open and stitching it ourselves!

OperatingRoomGhost3: Does a pig and a human have the same neck structure, you old fossil? Isn’t the mannequin the best option?

Hippocrates' Descendant: It is unwise to ignore the economic hardship of the living! We must seek another way!

Yeah, Hippocrates kid. You’re the best one here.

As I watched their idiotic yet strangely productive discussion, one thought flashed through my mind.

'Right, I can't afford it anyway. Then...'

To bring the discussion to an end, I made one last proposal.

Of course, I wasn’t serious.

HellJoseonSlave1: Please, guys, stop already. Since I can't afford the expensive ones anyway, I'll look into using the hospital facilities. Okay?

The gallery fell quiet for a moment at my suggestion.

And soon after, Hippocrates' Descendant posted a comment with the unmistakable tone of someone slapping his knee in realization.

No, from the way I saw it, this bastard had definitely slapped his knee.

Hippocrates' Descendant: Oh! That’s it exactly! As they say, the darkest place is under the lamp! Living one, isn't the best training room right where you work!

Fuck. Here it comes.

ㅇㅇ(211.36): Yeah! Hellslave! You said it gets scheduled, right! Then call your department chief or attending professor right now and politely ask if you can use the simulation room privately on your day off! That’s the most perfect solution!

And just like that, the discussion ended with the most ridiculous conclusion in the world.

I stared into space with empty eyes.

A first-year resident.

On his day off.

Calling the department chief.

'I really want to study, so could I maybe use the simulation room by myself?'—and ask that.

Am I insane?

But the ghosts were already in a festive mood.

ㅇㅇ(210.94): Call him!

OperatingRoomGhost3: Call him right now!

RespiratoryGhost: Man up and make the call!

I reluctantly picked up my phone.

And in my contacts list, I found the five characters that spelled 'Chief Park Woong.'

Fuck. Do I really have to do this?