Chapter 94

In order to welcome the arrival of Old Hunter, John specially asked Bergmann for a week's leave.

Bergmann readily agreed.

With the gradual application of new sterilization methods, the surgical ward of Charlotte Hospital finally no longer reeked of carbolic acid. Moreover, from both the objective conditions of patients after surgery and the subjective reactions of the doctors, Bergmann could confidently affirm that the new methods proposed by John had succeeded. Once more cases were accumulated, the paper could be published!

In such a situation, John's one-week leave was just a minor matter.

Taking advantage of this rare relaxation time, John accompanied Old Hunter for a good tour around Berlin. The old man had been away from Berlin for twenty years and was already very unfamiliar with this rapidly developing city. Many places were even less familiar to him than to John, who rarely wandered aimlessly. Therefore, running around every day did not bore him.

Both of them tacitly avoided talking about studies and the future.

John was waiting for the right moment, hoping that the two articles bearing his name would be published as soon as possible. When that happened, he could speak more confidently with his grandfather. As for Old Hunter, for some unknown reason, he did not mention the matter again after the few words on the first day in the carriage.

In short, the atmosphere between grandfather and grandson was exceptionally harmonious.

While John was at home with his grandfather in a relaxed mood, his thick letter set off from Berlin, passed through Hamburg by ship, and was then delivered to the capital of the British Empire—London...

...

In the 21st century on Earth, there is a giant in the scientific publishing world called Elsevier, which owns more than two thousand journals and is a true global publishing giant. Among this giant's many journals, the two most influential are *Cell* and *The Lancet*, also known as *Cell* and *The Lancet*.

In the era before John's穿越 (time travel), *Cell*, *Science*, and *Nature* were collectively known as CNS, the top journals in the natural sciences. *The Lancet*, founded in 1823, along with *The British Medical Journal*, *The New England Journal of Medicine*, and *The American Journal of Medicine*, became the four most famous authoritative comprehensive medical journals.

For most scientists, publishing articles in these journals is a matter of pride.

China is one of the countries that values this the most. John still clearly remembers a piece of news he once heard: a senior female student was hired as a professor and doctoral supervisor at a medical university after publishing an article in *Cell* during her doctoral studies. One article was worth the efforts of many peers for ten or even twenty years!

In this era, *The Lancet* was also an outstanding academic journal.

When Lister was facing obstacles everywhere, it was *The Lancet* that took the risk of being attacked and published his aseptic disinfection technique first, officially bringing this British physician to the historical stage. However, in this era, because the center of world medicine had shifted from Paris to Germany, German-language journals were the most prominent, and *The Lancet* was relatively less prominent.

More than a hundred years ago, the entire editorial department of *The Lancet* consisted of only three people.

Of course, although the number of people capable of conducting medical research was extremely small in this era, and the number of papers written each year was not many, three people could not sustain a journal, even a medical journal from more than a hundred years ago. In fact, these three people were only the resident editors of the journal. In addition, there were positions such as the chief editor and deputy chief editor, and some professionals often provided assistance and guidance as journal advisors...

The operation model of academic journals more than a hundred years ago was already quite mature.

Moreover, as a journal that had been in publication for over sixty years, the quality of *The Lancet*'s editors was quite high. They had all worked as clinical physicians and even conducted research in anatomy, physiology, and other fields. Therefore, most papers did not require external assistance to complete the review process, and they could handle it with ease.

However, today, Mr. Joseph Graham, an editor of *The Lancet*, was stumped.

What stumped him was a medical paper from Germany, which was related to blood and surgery. When Mr. Graham first saw the title of the paper, he was stunned.

"Inference of Human Blood Types and Common Causes of Death in Clinical Blood Transfusions."

The title was indeed quite peculiar!

Clinical blood transfusion, of course, Graham understood. After all, *The Lancet* was founded by a surgeon, and as an editor, Graham had some knowledge of this uncommon technique. Additionally, *The Lancet* had previously received similar articles, and Graham vaguely remembered that while this technique had saved some people, it had also killed more...

But what did "human blood types" mean?

Having lived for over thirty years, Graham was quite certain that he had never heard of this concept!

Driven by curiosity, Mr. Graham immediately read the lengthy paper carefully, trying to discover what the author meant by blood types. This was an era when medicine was gradually becoming a science, and new and exciting ideas were emerging every day. Clearly, Editor Graham enjoyed the feeling of being amazed by new discoveries.

Indeed, after reading the entire paper, Graham was stunned!

This German, John Hunter, was indeed very interesting. He actually believed that human blood had significant differences and divided it into four types: A, B, O, and AB. After a lengthy discussion, he concluded that the success or failure of blood transfusions was due to the compatibility or incompatibility of blood types!

This argument was truly remarkable!

Searching his memory, Graham could not find anything similar. Moreover, based on his previous education and experience as a physician, the content of the paper was already beyond his understanding!

However...

After reading the narrative and the experimental records in the paper, Graham felt that the author seemed to have ample evidence. Starting from the analysis of blood clotting phenomena, to the speculation of possible causes, and then through hundreds of cross-experiments, the author finally arrived at the corresponding results and conclusions, giving the reader a sense of credibility!

This seemingly contradictory aspect made Graham furrow his brow in deep thought.

"Hey, Joseph, what are you daydreaming about?"

Just as Mr. Graham was pondering the ideas in the paper, a curious voice from behind him caught his attention. His colleague David, whose desk was next to his, had noticed that his colleague had been in a daze after reading a submission and was naturally curious.

Awakened by his colleague's voice, Mr. Graham, as if finding an outlet, took a deep breath and said urgently, "David, the viewpoint in this paper is truly novel... You must read it right away!"

"Oh?"

Hearing Mr. Graham's words, David's curiosity was immediately piqued, and he quickly stood up, walked to Graham's desk, and began to read the paper carefully.

A moment later, David's face also showed a look of surprise, and after a while, he laughed and said, "Joseph, the viewpoint in this paper is indeed interesting... Tsk tsk, this must be a wild imagination, right? Can human blood really be divided into several types? Ha ha, this author is really amusing!"

Clearly, David did not agree with the viewpoint in the paper, and his expression and tone were tinged with a hint of ridicule.

Compared to Graham, who had only been a physician, David, who had been a university associate professor, was older and more experienced. However, he had never heard of a similar viewpoint either, so his first impression after reading the paper was that it was absurd and laughable. He shook his head, considering it just another whimsical idea from a surgeon.

"Is that so?"

Graham, however, did not entirely agree with his colleague's opinion. He frowned and said seriously, "But I think his viewpoint and evidence, though novel, are very convincing! Moreover, if this theory is correct, it can explain why different people's blood clots when they meet, and it can also explain why blood transfusions during surgery sometimes fail..."

"Ha ha ha..."

Hearing Graham's words, David could not help but laugh, shaking his head and saying, "Joseph, is the failure of surgery definitely due to blood transfusion? Why did many countries ban surgery half a century ago? It was because the success rate was too low! And even now, are the success rates of many surgeries very high?"

"This..."

For a moment, Joseph was speechless in response to David's question.

Indeed, there were too many reasons that could cause the failure of surgery, and no one could be certain that it was definitely due to blood transfusion. Graham could not argue with this point. In fact, if it were not for the discoveries and advancements in anesthesia, sterilization, and some surgical techniques in the past twenty years, many surgeries would still be off-limits for physicians. Even so, the mortality rate for slightly larger surgeries remained quite high.

It was indeed difficult to say that a patient's death was definitely related to blood types.

"I told you so!"

Seeing the doubt and hesitation on Graham's face, David felt quite pleased. He put down the paper, patted Graham's shoulder, and laughed, "Have we seen fewer bizarre papers in recent years? Many physicians can fabricate one just by thinking about it. If we were to investigate every single one in detail, the work would be too exhausting! And what's the author's name again?"

Glancing at the cover of the paper, David chuckled and said, "University of Berlin, John Hunter... Have you heard of this name?"

"No!"

Graham nodded subconsciously.

As an editor of the journal, in addition to his work, he also had to pay attention to the achievements of his peers, so he was naturally familiar with the outstanding physicians across Europe, especially those from places like the University of Berlin. However, he had no memory of this John Hunter.

David nodded smugly and said, "Hmph, I haven't heard of this Mr. Hunter either, so if the author is really from the University of Berlin, he is likely a young upstart... Just fooling around!"

After hearing this, Graham fell silent.

David's words seemed to make sense at first, but perhaps due to his personal intuition, Graham felt that the paper was not as simple as David said. He believed that the viewpoint expressed by this Mr. John Hunter was truly reasonable and, if proven correct, could explain many problems and have an immeasurable impact on clinical medicine, especially surgery!

"Alright, let's move on to the next one."

After expressing his opinion, David patted Graham's shoulder again, nodded with a smile, and returned to his desk to continue his work.

However, behind him, Graham did not follow his suggestion. Instead, he refocused his gaze on the cover of the paper, his eyes filled with hesitation, and the conflicted expression on his face lingered for a long time... (To be continued...)