The Physician of Traditional Medicine Returns from Murim - Chapter 146

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This chapter was translated by Lunox Team. To support us and help keep this series going, visit our website: LunoxScans.com
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Chapter 146

“Experience, you know.”

It wasn’t really that surprising.

When you work in this field, you naturally learn to identify problems just by watching how patients walk into the examination room.

“Most symptoms of ‘throwing out your back’ are quadratus lumborum sprains. Since it attaches to the iliac crest you’re holding below and the 12th rib above, you get uncomfortable symptoms when breathing deeply or coughing.”

“Ah, I see…”

I had Jin Minjeong lie face down and checked everything from her glutes to the erector spinae and quadratus lumborum.

“This is where it hurts, right?”

“Ugh, yes!”

“We can treat it directly at the tender spot. Ideally, you’d want 3-4 days of bed rest with repeated treatments, but since you have to work tomorrow, I’ll make you as comfortable as possible.”

“Oh my, I’m sorry and thank you.”

“Don’t mention it. When you’re exercising, sometimes enthusiasm gets the better of you. Let’s go to the treatment room and have you lie on your side.”

Checking the chart for waiting patients, all the follow-up patients were receiving hot packs or physical therapy first.

It would be best to apply acupuncture right away.

“Lie on your side and stretch your arm upward. It’ll expose your lower back well.”

“Like this?”

This position best exposes the quadratus lumborum.

When there are overall lower back problems, I treat them while the patient lies prone, but since the target area was clear now, I had her take the lateral position.

“I’m going to insert a slightly long needle.”

Concentrating my energy, I could see that the blood stasis from the sprain was located somewhat deep.

I took out a long needle and slowly palpated the muscle starting from the ilium.

“You’ll feel a throbbing sensation.”

“Huh, okay.”

Since Jin Minjeong wasn’t unfamiliar with acupuncture, she relaxed comfortably.

Swoosh. Swooosh.

I inserted and manipulated the long needle several times at the precise point.

“That’s it. Sit up and let’s check your lower back condition.”

And I immediately had Jin Minjeong sit up.

“Don’t get up suddenly, take it slow.”

“Yes… huh?”

She quickly put on her slippers and walked back and forth beside the bed.

“Earlier I could barely walk straight, but now it’s like nothing happened!”

The aching symptoms that had been so severe she could barely stand upright had disappeared.

“Perfect. You’ll recover smoothly. We’ve solved the main problem, so let’s do physical therapy to relax the muscles and finish with cupping to draw out the blood.”

“Thank you!”

Jin Minjeong let out a sigh of relief.

She must have been very worried about what to do if it didn’t heal by tomorrow.

“Did it really heal right away?”

“Yes. When I stand up and balance myself, the way strength enters my lower back is completely different.”

“Wow, the Clinic Director is really a master physician…”

I could faintly hear the conversation between Seol Yuhui, who was setting up physical therapy for the lower back, and the patient.

Oh my, it’s nothing that amazing!

I quickly entered the examination room and closed the door.

* * *

Jin Minjeong, who had received acupuncture early in the morning, returned home.

Normally, she would have done the backed-up laundry and cleaning, bought groceries for the week, prepared dinner, and only then collapsed on the sofa.

“Ah, let’s just rest.”

Today she just lay down right away.

It would be troublesome if she overdid it and it interfered with tomorrow’s work.

When she woke up this morning, she really thought she was in big trouble.

From the moment she got out of bed and put her feet down, shock waves hit her lower back.

It was so amazing that the pain almost disappeared with just one needle that she actually wanted to walk around.

But she suppressed the urge and sent a message to her husband.

Let’s just order takeout for dinner tonight.

“Honey, is your back okay?”

Why does time lying around and lounging go by so quickly?

It didn’t feel like she had rested much, but her husband and children came home with pizza they had mentioned wanting to try before.

“You got takeout?!”

“Yeah. It was right next to Jihoon’s taekwondo academy.”

“Thanks, you worked hard.”

“Don’t mention it. Your back…”

“I’m resting just in case, but it’s almost completely healed.”

Seeing her walking out to eat pizza, Jin Minjeong’s husband Oh Junseok was greatly relieved.

He had thought she might be seriously injured and need several days of rest.

“It got this much better in just one day?”

“Our Clinic Director is an incredible master physician.”

Although she wasn’t the one who treated them, Jin Minjeong’s shoulders rose with pride.

Whenever patients hugged them with gifts at the desk, expressing their gratitude, she felt happy and proud along with them.

At hair salons, parent meetings, and other places, whenever someone mentioned being in pain somewhere, she never failed to tell them to come to our Oriental Medicine Clinic.

“Do you treat many patients with stiff shoulders too?”

But for her husband to ask something like that.

“Of course, tons of them! Why, honey, are your shoulders stiff?”

“No. Mine got better after that back spasm I had last time. It’s not me, but there’s someone at our community center who’s always tapping their shoulders.”

Jin Minjeong unconsciously raised her voice.

“If there’s someone like that, you should tell them to come right away!”

“Ah, r-right. I should mention it when I go tomorrow. They really tap their shoulders once every 10 minutes. There was even a complaint filed.”

Oh Junseok answered somewhat flustered.

Only then did Jin Minjeong realize her voice had gotten loud and calmed her excitement.

“Bad enough for a complaint to be filed?”

“The guy who filed the complaint is crazy, but it does look pretty severe.”

* * *

Administrative Officer Kim Hye-yeong was working hard today as well.

“Hello~!”

“Please print out a seal certificate.”

“Yes~ Could you give me your ID?”

As a civil servant receiving the nation’s salary, she responded sincerely and kindly to citizens’ requests.

“It’s not registered. You’re registering for the first time, right? Could you give me your seal?”

“Seal? I didn’t bring it.”

“…Have you registered before? The process of stamping your seal and fingerprint?”

“No. I need it for the first time now.”

But she couldn’t help the anger that surged up from time to time.

“Without a seal, seal registration and certificate issuance is difficult. Please bring your ID and seal and visit again.”

“Ah, if I go home now and come back, it’ll be closing time. I’ll bring it tomorrow, so please issue the certificate first.”

“How can I issue a certificate when it’s not registered?”

“Just do it first! I can register later!”

“How can I issue a certificate when it’s not registered…!”

“Are you an automated response machine? Why do you say the same thing twice?”

A problematic complainant who came almost every other day.

Making unreasonable demands first! Did they even know they were being unreasonable?

“What’s your name and position? Where do you get angry while eating my tax money? I’m filing a complaint!”

“This cra…!”

“Officer, please endure it!”

Kim Hye-yeong was today as well.

Working hard.

Hard, hard…

“Ah! My shoulders hurt even more because I’m angry!”

As soon as work hours ended, she got up from the counter faster than anyone else.

Her shoulders were already heavy and driving her crazy, and the stress on top of that made her feel like she was going insane.

“It was the junior’s turn today. It must be really tough, right?”

A close senior approached and massaged Kim Hye-yeong’s shoulders.

Since strange people appeared countless times and someone always had to be the victim, all the colleague staff members looked at Kim Hye-yeong with pitying eyes.

“Aaaaah!”

“How did it get hard like a rock? It’s amazing every time I touch it.”

“Haha, Senior. It must be tiring for you, so you can stop.”

“No. It’s not tiring. I have good grip strength, but this really won’t massage out. Is it because of your clothes? Try taking off your cardigan.”

Although she knew the senior was suggesting it with kind intentions, Kim Hye-yeong waved her hands dismissively.

“Aren’t you hot? On busy days like today, it was hot.”

Of course it was hot.

If she lay down at home with the air conditioner set to 26 degrees, it was perfectly comfortable.

But when there were many people in the space or when anger surged due to complainants like just before, she felt burning hot.

“I don’t really feel the heat much.”

But she didn’t take off her cardigan.

She had a complex about her raised shoulders.

Had it been like that since high school? She noticed it when taking group photos with friends.

They all wore tank tops for the photo, but wasn’t she the only one whose trapezius muscles stood out tremendously?

It was somewhat better in university, but her muscles started knotting up again as she stressed over civil service exam preparation.

She thought everything would be fine once she passed, but in her case, work stress was even greater than during exam preparation.

She got angry several times a day, and tension built up in her shoulders.

– Who cares about something like that?

Friends and her boyfriend who heard this story all said that, but she was just personally bothered by it.

How desperate must she have been to even try Botox?

“Ugh.”

Kim Hye-yeong had nothing to say and just quietly patted her shoulder.

When will the team leader get up? I want to leave quickly.

As soon as she had that scary thought, Team Leader Oh Junseok got up from his seat.

It was exactly 2 minutes past the hour.

“Your shoulder won’t loosen up?”

“Oh, yes…”

But had she been talking too loudly?

He approached Kim Hye-yeong to talk about shoulder pain.

“My wife works at an oriental medicine clinic, and they’re really good there. The back strain I had the day before yesterday was cured right away. Why don’t you try going there once, Deputy Manager?”

“An oriental medicine clinic?”

She hadn’t thought about going to an oriental medicine clinic for treatment.

She just lived by roughly patting it and stretching, and when it got too severe, she would go get a massage.

Massages or physical therapy would be fine for a day or two, but she couldn’t go every day, could she?

“Don’t the needles hurt?”

Today was exactly one of those days when the pain was too severe.

She was planning to ask her boyfriend to massage her shoulders when they met, but would it be okay to stop by an oriental medicine clinic first?

Her boyfriend was already getting annoyed because she asked for massages too often.

“Getting poked with needles…”

“Ugh.”

“It can’t be completely painless, but they do it skillfully so it doesn’t hurt much. I was fine with it. Wouldn’t that be better than having your shoulder hurt like that all the time?”

That was true too.

If it would just loosen up, getting poked a few times would be okay.

Massages hurt quite a bit too.

“Where is it?”

Fortunately, the oriental medicine clinic the team leader recommended wasn’t too far away.

Kim Hye-yeong sent a message to her boyfriend asking if it would be okay to postpone their date a little.

[Oppa, you haven’t left work yet, right? Can I meet you after going to an oriental medicine clinic?]

[Yeah.. I was about to tell you anyway since it looks like I’ll be working overtime..]

Fortunately or unfortunately, her busy boyfriend readily accepted the request.

Kim Hye-yeong immediately rushed to the oriental medicine clinic.

* * *

“Hello, Doctor.”

A woman entered the examination room with a very determined expression.

Was this her first time getting acupuncture? She seemed very nervous, as if she had made a big decision to come to the oriental medicine clinic.

“I came because my shoulder hurts too much.”

The patient’s name was Kim Hye-yeong, 29 years old. Shoulder pain.

The referrer was Oh Junseok… Jin Minjeong’s husband, right?

I looked at the preliminary examination results on the chart and her posture of lifting her shoulder with tension, and grasped the general problem.

“Could you point to where it’s uncomfortable?”

First, I asked about the location.

She said shoulder, but precisely speaking, ‘shoulder’ in the narrow sense refers to the shoulder joint.

The upper trapezius is the neck. Of course, I use them interchangeably too.

As expected, she pointed to her upper trapezius.

Since it was muscle, it was a much easier area to treat than the shoulder joint.

“Your trapezius isn’t good. How long has it been like this?”

Just from her behavior, it didn’t seem acute.

“About 12 years?”

A bigger time frame came out than I expected.

“It’s always been bad since high school. I think it’s because I sit for long periods and get stressed.”

Kim Hye-yeong crossed both arms in an X shape and hugged her shoulders.

“It’s an office worker’s occupational disease. No one sits in the correct posture, and no matter how good it is, staying in the same position makes you stiff.”

“Yes. I try to do it properly, but it’s not easy.”

“Consciously relax your strength, and if correct posture is difficult, it’s better to raise your chair and work while comfortably slouching. Working with raised shoulders on a low chair keeps tension in them.”

“Ah, yes.”

The posture issue was a long-term matter, and it was important to loosen what was currently tense.

After checking the range of motion, I got up from my seat to examine the intensity of pain.

I was planning to go behind the chair where the patient was sitting and press on her shoulder.

“Looking at your movement, the trapezius problem seems to be the biggest. Let me feel it once.”

“Wait a moment!”

Then Kim Hye-yeong was startled and quickly extended both palms.

“Yes?”

I was just trying to conduct a normal examination, but was there some problem?

Since she was refusing, I couldn’t touch her body, so I waited for a moment.

“Whew…”

Kim Hye-yeong took a deep breath to prepare herself mentally.

She began unbuttoning her cardigan one by one.

“It’s so stiff… it’s protruding like this…”

Her voice as she removed her clothes was beyond melancholy, almost pitiful.

“Can this be healed too?”

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