Doctor’s Rebirth - Chapter 826

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 826
“They say it’s Xiao Ke.”
I nodded inwardly.
‘Judging by the complexion and that sweet-smelling breath, it certainly appears to be the case.’
Regardless, a direct examination came first.
I took the elderly man’s wrist.
Xiao Ke (消渴).
The Eastern medical term for diabetes.
Diabetes is surprisingly a disease discovered long ago in both East and West.
However, this disease is known as an incurable illness in both Eastern and Western medicine. Modern medicine also classifies it as essentially incurable.
‘Diabetes occurs because the glucose flowing through the bloodstream is difficult for the body to absorb.’
People must eat to survive.
Among these foods, items like rice and bread contain a component called carbohydrates.
What are carbohydrates?
A general term encompassing all saccharides. So this includes starch found in wheat, potatoes, corn, and rice, as well as simple sugars and cellulose.
In other words, when you eat rice, it’s digested into glucose.
Cakes are also digested into glucose, and fried foods too. Since no sugar was sprinkled on it, there’s no glucose, so it’s fine—some patients think this way, but that’s not how it works.
It’s all glucose.
However, in diabetic patients, this digested glucose cannot be absorbed into the body and instead circulates through the bloodstream.
That is precisely diabetes.
When this happens, blood glucose levels rise, and this causes countless complications, making it a dangerous disease.
Let me give an example.
Suppose blood glucose was normally 100, but one day it becomes 300.
This 300 consists entirely of those sweet sugar-like clumps called glucose.
They accumulate and adhere throughout the blood vessels. They also interfere with the absorption of other nutrients and the transport of cellular tissue within the blood.
Glucose is favored by red blood cells, but bacteria love it too.
Even the saliva of diabetic patients attracts bacteria, which triggers gum disease.
What about the blood itself?
It becomes thick and sticky from the glucose.
Problems are inevitable.
If an artery suddenly becomes blocked? Arteriosclerosis.
If a blood vessel leading to the brain suddenly becomes blocked? Stroke.
As the blood becomes thick and sticky, the kidneys are easily damaged.
If the capillaries that serve as a kind of filter in the kidneys become blocked, proteinuria develops. When this happens, foam appears in the urine.
Our entire body is connected, so when one kidney becomes diseased, other parts begin to deteriorate in sequence.
Too extreme?
Let’s look at the smaller issues.
Skin conditions naturally occur.
For fungi like athlete’s foot, the sweat of these diabetic patients is a delicacy.
Even with the same cold, diabetic patients have a threefold higher probability of developing pneumonia.
Diabetic pneumonia.
Beyond this, as the body deteriorates like the root of all ailments and quality of life plummets, it’s fair to say the complications of diabetes are more terrifying than diabetes itself.
‘At least in modern medicine, blood sugar can be controlled through insulin and various medications, allowing us to manage the harm caused by diabetes to some degree.’
But.
With the medical standards of the past, living long after contracting diabetes was nearly impossible.
Usually people would pass away within a few years.
‘Still, fortunately, there exists one treatment method in this martial world.’
That’s right.
American pharmaceutical companies make fortunes from diabetes medications, but that’s not possible here—the reason being.
The unit cost doesn’t work out, which is why the Pharmaceutical Sect Leader is seriously asking if we could please abandon this research.
It’s martial arts.
Diabetes ultimately becomes a problem because blood sugar rises.
However, those who practice martial arts learn cultivation techniques, and through this their metabolism operates on an entirely different level than ordinary people.
Because of this.
(Unless it’s a special type of demonic or corrupted cultivation technique) diabetes is difficult to develop in the first place, and even if it does occur, simply circulating qi properly through nourishing cultivation and practicing external techniques for about two hours a day naturally regulates blood sugar levels.
In other words, practicing martial arts controls diabetes and makes it no different from being cured.
However, this isn’t a perfect treatment method.
Because practicing martial arts isn’t easy—among ordinary commoners, how many could actually go to a martial school to learn cultivation?
Moreover, without receiving foundational training in childhood, the number of people who immediately feel inner energy is truly minuscule.
External techniques are generally the maximum benefit ordinary people can obtain.
If martial arts were easy to learn, the interior of Hwaguk would have become a paradise for martial artists.
Even so, learning external techniques alone was beneficial for diabetes.
‘This is better than insulin.’
The reason I only discuss acquired Type 2 diabetes is simple.
Type 1 diabetes, where insulin secretion fails from birth, people either die without even knowing what diabetes is, or wealthy families purchase spiritual pills to buy time and practice nourishing cultivation alongside simple external techniques.
And they practice nourishing cultivation and simple external techniques together.
Of course, this is only in very fortunate cases.
Commoners usually die at a young age without even knowing what Type 1 diabetes is.
In small villages like this, it’s not even easy to meet a doctor.
Because of this, the Pharmaceutical Sect Leader hopes I’ll abandon insulin research.
But despite this, I continued the insulin research.
While martial arts cultivation is certainly a panacea for diabetes specifically, we need a way to buy time before that achievement arrives.
Besides, there are people who cannot practice martial arts due to their circumstances.
‘I am working hard on improvements, but I’m suffering because the unit cost still doesn’t work out.’
That’s the situation.
In this martial world, diabetes is a disease the wealthy are prone to getting, but conversely, it’s also a disease they’re good at treating.
A cruel world where those born with a heavenly curse die.
‘In this era, there are few people affluent enough to develop diabetes from overindulgence.’
But there is exactly one exception.
The elderly.
Diabetes in the elderly.
Even without particularly poor eating habits, a person can develop diabetes simply by aging.
From the thirties onward, fasting blood sugar gradually rises, and postprandial blood sugar increases as a matter of course.
Aging bit by bit like this, then suddenly growing old all at once, pancreatic function weakening, physical activity decreasing, insulin resistance increasing….
Add genetic factors, illness, and various other things to this, and diabetes simply arrives.
That’s what aging is.
It might be what people call the Mandate of Heaven—the lifespan determined by the heavens.
But must we accept all of this simply because we age?
I released my hand from the patient’s wrist and pulled back the blanket.
Black spots were visible.
I examined their size, color, and texture.
‘Already… they’ve already entered the severe stage.’
Black ulceration.
Diabetic foot disease.
Not necessarily limited to these black, circular ulcers—it’s a general term for various foot conditions caused by diabetes.
Among these, small wounds can turn black and ulcerate, or even a simple blister can spread into an ulcer like this.
If the size is small, surgery, procedures, and medication can reverse it. But if it worsens, eventually the foot or toes must be amputated.
Fortunately, we’re now at a stage where treatment is possible without amputation.
Especially since simply pushing out the waste from blood vessels through capillaries should keep blood circulation problem-free for a while.
But.
‘Diabetes is ultimately a condition requiring management.’
It was natural that the doctors said it couldn’t be done by their own power.
Continuous management to lower blood sugar—in other words, in Gangho, it’s a disease that continues unless one practices martial arts.
A doctor wouldn’t teach martial arts either.
Jeong Gajang asked.
“What do you think? Can it be cured?”
I smiled.
“Of course. It can certainly be cured.”
Jin Nonya, who had entered with me, spoke in surprise.
“Is that truly so! Indeed, you are the renowned Medical Officer of Baekrin Uiseon! Master Jangju! You can be saved! Of course! How great is the benevolence you have bestowed, Master Jangju….”
It seemed Jin Nonya didn’t know what diabetes was.
Or perhaps he didn’t know that curing diabetes required martial arts.
Both possibilities existed.
What all doctors know as common knowledge, commoners often don’t.
It’s different from an era where illiteracy is nearly nonexistent and information can be obtained simply by searching the internet.
“Hehehehe.”
Jeong Gajang simply laughed.
I spoke.
“However, there is one thing I would like to ask.”
“Please, ask away.”
A blue light gleamed in Jin Cheon-hee’s eyes.
“When did you stop training in martial arts?”
“….”
* * *
“Hyeong. Are you going to give up?”
“What else can I do? The patient has lost the will to live….”
Jin Cheon-hee and Sama Hyeon walked away from Jeong Gajangju.
Behind them, the ancient estate stood in quiet repose.
Though it had been maintained meticulously, it lacked a certain vitality—much like the master of this house himself, I thought.
‘A reason to live, a reason to live.’
I could imagine how hollow it would sound to simply tell him to live because life itself was precious, because life was beautiful.
A life without purpose.
In this sprawling estate, there were no children, no grandchildren—nothing else.
In an agrarian society, ten or twelve people lived under one roof.
But here was an only child, and the only grandchild of an only child.
‘When he dies, this house will be empty.’
There were ways to entrust the estate and fortune to relatives, to ask them to perform ancestral rites, but what good would that do?
“Diabetes ultimately comes down to self-management.”
“And for that, he’d need to train consistently in martial arts?”
“Exactly. But he’s already made it clear he won’t.”
Jeong Gajangju.
He had said this.
-Heh heh. What does this old man have left to cling to life for? That’s enough. I’m grateful to you for coming this far, Doctor, but I wish to decide my own ending. Please, take your leave.
A gentle but resolute refusal.
It was a statement that contained the very essence of a weary, aged general’s life.
I had seen such people occasionally on Earth as well.
-Doctor. I… I want to stop now. The chemotherapy. The surgery. I don’t want to burden my family anymore. How many more years will I live doing this? So I….
In truth, the biggest factor was money.
Even with medical insurance, the continuous expenses for an incurable disease were certainly a burden.
Next came guilt toward family.
They knew how much their family suffered because of them.
So parents would abandon treatment for the sake of their children.
And finally, last of all, came their own suffering.
Surprisingly, people often abandoned their lives not because of the pain of treatment, but simply because of love.
For a spouse, for a child.
Humans were strong against pain, yet soft as tofu before love.
People die because of love.
It was the same now.
The elderly man was not dying because training in martial arts again for diabetes treatment was painful.
He was dying because those he loved had already passed.
Love was the most certain poison of all.
That poison was so potent that no miraculous cure could ever treat it, and even I, So Ui-seon, could not heal it.
“Having already lost my entire family, whose words would I even listen to….”
Sama Hyeon’s violet eyes gazed intently at Jin Cheon-hee’s expression.
“Why?”
….
Jin Cheon-hee asks, sensing Sama Hyeon’s gaze.
“Gaga, I’ve come up with a good idea~”
“An idea?”

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Novels. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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