Chapter 8 Calculating Medicinal Costs

  After writing the Guizhi, Zhang Gui paused for a moment and wrote Shan Zha next. He then added Lai Fu Zi, Mu Xiang, Qing Pi and several other medicines that dispel food stagnation and treat gastric distension and pain. After finishing writing the prescription, he handed it to Zhang Shao Yang: "Prepare the medicine according to the prescription."

  "Zhao asked: 'What's wrong with me?'"

  "Hmm..." Left Guixu pondered for a moment, then said: "You have stomach pain, vomiting acid water, nausea and loss of appetite. This is a case of food stagnation in the stomach!"

  "But you haven't even asked me about the tongue coating yet, nor have you inquired about my pain in detail, whether it's a stabbing pain, a dull ache or a lingering discomfort. How can you be so sure of this diagnosis?"

  Zuo Gui felt his face burning, the rent issue had made him extremely depressed, and his son had fallen and gotten a long wound on the back of his head. Although he didn't know how it had healed, he wasn't sure if there was any internal injury. The landlord was pressing for rent, and he couldn't afford to examine carefully. After hearing his son's words, he hastily wrote a prescription without even checking his tongue or asking questions. In front of the patient, he naturally couldn't admit this, so he just forced an explanation, fortunately, in the dim light, no one could see his flushed face. He cleared his throat and said, "Your illness is not serious, it can be diagnosed without looking at your tongue."

  Zhao San Niang was half-believing and half-doubting: "Really?"

  "Don't worry, after taking my medicine, your illness will definitely be cured. - You like eating hawthorn, don't you?"

  "Yes, I love to eat hawthorn the most. I eat it whenever I have something or nothing to do. People say that hawthorn can help digest food and open up one's appetite. Since my stomach isn't good, eating hawthorn allows me to eat more rice."

  "That's right, the second flavor in this medicine is hawthorn, and it's also a monarch drug. You must love to eat it!"

  "Is it? Then it's great! Let's get the medicine then, I still have to hurry back for dinner!"

  "It's okay, but you need to take care of this illness gradually, and it may be necessary to take medicine for a while."

  "Alright, just take a dozen or so, it's fine. I'm too lazy to run around anyway. Besides, if you guys can't pay the rent on New Year's Eve and leave, I'll have to find someone else to prescribe medicine for me, what a hassle! Let you guys make some money too, just open up a few more this one time."

  When they were talking, Zuo Shaoyang listened to his father Zuo Gui's words about the medication and quickly picked up the prescription to take a look. He couldn't help but secretly sigh with sorrow. Now he understood why their family's pharmacy business was so sluggish. Zhao San Niang had been eating hawthorn as a snack, eating it randomly before and after meals, which led to gastric ulcers. Although he hadn't asked about the diagnosis or taken her pulse, Zuo Shaoyang was already certain of the cause of her illness, and the corresponding prescription was also ready. Regardless of the final diagnosis, it should be a nourishing stomach prescription. However, his father Zuo Gui diagnosed it as food stagnation in the stomach, which was completely off the mark. One of the patient's main complaints was loss of appetite, how could there be food stagnation? Moreover, the prescription he wrote heavily used hawthorn, wasn't that adding insult to injury? It showed that his father didn't even know what caused the illness.

  Left Shao Yang couldn't directly say that this prescription not only didn't match the symptoms, but would also worsen the condition. If he said that, Old Dad would lose all face. Before crossing over, it was because he hadn't taken care of Director Wang's face, and now he had come to pick a fight with him. Now it was Old Dad, if he said so, even if the illness was cured, the signboard of Gui Zhi Tang might be smashed.

  Zuo Gui glared at Zuo Shao Yang and said, "Why haven't you gone to fetch the medicine yet?"

  "Oh!" Zuo Shaoyang took the prescription and walked towards the counter.

  Zuo Gui raised his voice and said: "You don't even bring a lantern, how can you catch medicine? What are you doing, like you've lost your soul?"

  Zuo Shaoyang hurried back to fetch the oil lamp, walked to the counter and put the lamp down, placed Fangzi on the counter, thought for a moment, and still decided to follow his own prescription to grab the medicine. Anyway, the prescription was not given to the patient, and Zhao Sanniang did not know what medicine Zuo Gui had actually prescribed.

  After grabbing the medicine, hold it tightly and bring it over to Zhao San Niang. Zhao San Niang asked: "How much money?"

  Zuo Shaoyang looked at Zuo Gui and said, "Didn't you calculate it just now?"

  "Am I supposed to?" In modern hospitals, the cashier and pharmacy are separate. Zuo Shaoyang only took care of finding Fang and getting medicine, not dealing with pricing issues, so he didn't have this habit.

  "Nonsense! Are you incapable of calculation? Do I have to come over and help you count your money?"

  "Oh!" Zuo Shaoyang returned to the counter, picked up the price tag, and felt a bit dizzy. There was no price on the tag, and he looked around the counter but didn't see a price list either. How could they calculate it like this?

  "What's wrong?"

  "I don't know the price of the medicine!" Zuo Shaoyang also said in a low voice.

  Alang thought his younger brother had not recovered from his memory loss, and his face was full of worry. He turned his head to glance at Zuo Gui, seeing that Zuo Gui was also looking at them with a puzzled expression. He quickly lowered his voice and said: "The price of the medicine is written on the medicine cabinet, and there's also an account book in the drawer below."

  Zuo Shao Yang hastily held up the oil lamp and walked over to check on the medicine cabinet. Indeed, the price was written in small letters on the label of each medicine. He thought for a moment, realizing that he couldn't calculate the price based on his own prescription, or else Old Man Zuo would immediately know something was off. He had to follow the original prescription. Busy turned around and picked up Old Man Zuo's prescription, first grabbing two types of medicine before suddenly becoming stuck - there was one type of medicine he didn't recognize. It was understandable that no one could remember all several thousand types of Chinese medicine; it was already impressive if someone could remember a few hundred commonly used ones. Not recognizing the medicine was normal, and he held the prescription in a daze, scanning the labels on the medicine cabinet, slowly searching, but with so many medicines, how could he find it in just a short while?

  "What's wrong?" Zuigui raised his voice and asked.

  "Nothing... nothing at all." Zuo Shao Yang continued searching, his heart growing anxious, and the more he searched, the slower it went.

  Angelica rushed in and asked in a low voice, "What's wrong?"

  Zuo Shaoyang handed the prescription to Huixiang and pointed to a medicine on it, saying in a low voice, "Where is the 'Shi Gu'?"

  "Where is it?"

  Zuo Shaoyang took a look and indeed saw the words "Shi Gu" written on it. He pulled out the medicine box and took a look, and couldn't help but laugh and cry at the same time. It turned out that this "Shi Gu" was actually the commonly used medicine for warming and resolving cold phlegm - "Ban Xia"!

  The names of traditional Chinese medicines were very confusing in ancient times, with the same medicine often having several or even dozens of different names. The same name was also used for different medicines, which was quite common. After the modernization of traditional Chinese medicine and the publication of pharmacopeia, the names of medicines were standardized. Doctors in hospitals usually use the standardized names when writing prescriptions. Zuo Shao Yang learned these standardized names when he studied, and as a matter of course, he also knew some commonly used aliases, such as "Ban Xia", which was called "Di Wen" or "Shui Yu" in the "Shennong Ben Cao Jing". However, the alias "Shi Gu" appeared in the "Ming Yi Bie Lu" during the Wei and Jin dynasties. There were more than a dozen other aliases, but Zuo Shao Yang couldn't remember them all. Nevertheless, when he saw the medicinal materials, even if they were processed into small pieces for drinking, he could recognize them immediately.

  After finding the prices of all the medicines, Zuo Shao Yang wrote them down with a brush. In ancient times, there were no computers or calculators to help you calculate accounts, so he could only do it himself. He found a piece of cowhide paper and saw an inkstone on the table, with a pen holder holding a wolf hair brush. He picked it up, wanting to write, but the tip of the pen had frozen. He remembered that his father, Zuo Gui, had a pen on his desk, and he had just written a prescription earlier, so he hurried over to take the brush.

  "What's with the pen?" Zuo Gui stared at him with wide eyes.

  "Time to settle accounts!"

  "Settle accounts? Settle accounts with a pen?" Zuo Gui stared with his eyes wide open and said, "How can you settle accounts with a pen?"

  Ancient people performed arithmetic operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division using counting rods. They used a set of short sticks arranged in various prescribed shapes to represent numbers, following fixed rules for calculations. People who often had to calculate would carry a small bag with them containing counting rods, allowing them to perform calculations at any time. Although the abacus was invented as early as the Eastern Han dynasty, it did not become widespread during the Tang and Song dynasties because the method of calculation using beads was not yet perfected, and it was slower and less convenient than counting rods. Zuo Gui and others used counting rods for arithmetic operations; they had never seen anyone use a pen to list formulas for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, so they were naturally very surprised.