Feature: Village doctor's relay of safeguarding health

NANCHANG, Feb. 9 (Xinhua) -- Eighty-one-year-old Xu Qiusheng often looks out of the window of his clinic when he is not with a patient, as he feels relief when looking up at the luxuriant branches and foliage of an old camphor tree that stays green all year round.

Over half a century has passed since Xu graduated from medical school and worked as a village doctor in Yangfang Village, Fengcheng City, in east China's Jiangxi Province.

"Three generations of my family including my parents, and my grandchildren all come to Uncle Xu for treatment," said Chen Donggen who took his feverish granddaughter to Xu's clinic.

After briefly inquiring about the little girl's condition, Xu took out a very thin needle from a wooden medical kit, and gently inserted the needle into the skin of both her hands and head.

The treatment is called acupuncture, the most commonly used to treat pain in traditional Chinese medicine.

Xu has used the set of silver needles for decades to help villagers relieve discomforts such as joint pains, frozen shoulders, and headaches.

"Uncle Xu is the one who can set our minds at ease in the village," Chen added.

Dubbed "guardians of health," village doctors like Xu who work at grassroots medical institutions, have played important roles in treating hundreds of millions of farmers in rural areas.

They always keep a busy schedule -- offering outpatient service during the day and dealing with emergency cases now and then in the evening, staying on call around the clock to see patients.

Xu said treatment and medicine were usually free of charge for villagers facing financial difficulties, and he kept the costs of patients in an account book as he allows credit.

Albeit living a frugal life, he never asked for the medical expenses owed by villagers.

Xu also maintained regular contact with high-risk people in the village to keep abreast of their health conditions.

Ahead of this year's Spring Festival, Xu, together with his daughter who returned to the village and walked in the footsteps of his lifelong career as a village doctor, visited the elderly door by door.

Xu's daughter helped them measure their blood pressure and blood oxygen as a follow-up physical examination after the latest round of COVID-19 infections.

After the optimized COVID response measures, the health of over 1,400 villagers in Yangfang had become a new challenge for rural doctors like Xu and his daughter.

The clinic received at most 30 patients per day and doctors would deliver medicines to villagers door to door. Early this year, the village smoothly passed the peak infection.

Xu is also delighted to see his grandson take the baton and begin his career as a doctor after graduation.

"I see my patients as my family members, and I hope the next generations of doctors in rural areas can continue to be the guardians of villagers," Xu said.