Modu Ruijin Hospital Pancreatic Surgery Intensive Care Unit, six in the morning.
Forty-nine-year-old patient Mr. Shen Guohua lies on the hospital bed, his abdomen is swollen with a large amount of ascites, resembling a woman seven months pregnant. His skin and whites of the eyes have turned yellow; this is obstructive jaundice caused by the pancreatic tumor pressing on the bile duct. The numbers on the monitor are not optimistic: heart rate at 112 beats/min, blood oxygen saturation at 92%, body temperature at 38.5℃.
His wife, Ms. Zhou Min, holds his thin hand, her eyes red and swollen. Over the past three months, they have been to Beijing and Shanghai, and the conclusion is always the same: late-stage pancreatic cancer with liver metastasis, an expected survival of three to six months, and no effective treatment. Mr. Shen has wasted away from 160 pounds to less than 100 pounds.
