‘Below Deck Med’: Captain Sandy Shares This Important Tip About CPR
Captain Sandy Yawn from Below Deck Mediterranean is a “safety first” captain. She’s spoken openly about the near-death experience Ashton Pienaar had on Below Deck and has been candid about the importance of crew training.
While she is a stickler for crew training, she’s equally as demanding on herself. She recently posted about going back to class to update her own certifications, with CPR being one course that has changed since she last learned the skill.
She posted to Instagram, “The only way to get to the bridge is to start with the basics. I’m back in school to renew one of the first classes I ever took. #medicalcpr @mpt1915 which was the school I chose 29 years ago!” She added that the CPR technique is new, plus she referenced the song that makes this life-saving skill a little easier for students.
Everybody is ‘Stayin’ Alive’
When The Office featured the cast doing CPR to the Bee Gees hit “Stayin’ Alive,” it was an instant viral sensation. In fact, a man recently saved a woman’s life when he recalled the episode and used the technique.
Cross Scott discovered an unconscious woman in her car. The 21-year-old managed to get the woman out of the car and started CPR using the song “Stayin’ Alive,” WGN Chicago reports. Scott claimed to have no CPR training, but The Office episode guided him. After doing chest compressions for a minute, the woman was breathing. She was briefly hospitalized and released.
Dr. Alson S. Inaba, M.D. created the technique, Hands-Only™ CPR for this very reason–to help people with no CPR training still be able to save a life. “If you have not been trained in conventional CPR, Hands-Only CPR can buy critical time until the paramedics arrive with an AED to shock the victim’s heart into its normal rhythm,” he wrote on the American Heart Association site.
Why this song?
Inaba shared why he married this popular tune to CPR. “I realized the song had at least 100 beats per minute — the same rate the American Heart Association recommends for CPR chest compressions,” he recalled. “This could be the perfect teaching tool!”
“The Stayin’ Alive CPR technique came to life because I needed a way to emphasize the importance of CPR and early AED use to my students,” he continued. “In a skit, a student suddenly collapsed — then a group of residents sporting dark glasses, gold chains and a boom box blaring ‘Stayin’ Alive’ rushed to perform CPR.”
Now Captain Sandy is learning the new technique
Yawn added to her Instagram post, “CPR has changed since I started. Now we just press to the beat of Stay’n Alive just like the song!” She also gave fans a peek inside the classroom on her Instagram story too.
“I have to take this class, medical first aid,” she said showing the manual to the camera. The camera panned over the CPR dummy waiting for her to test out the new technique.
Fans loved the post and commented. “Yesss!! Bee Gees at 9 am. Made my day,” one person remarked. Another person recalled The Office episode too. “I am imagining the episode of The Office where Michael Scott arranges a CPR class hahaha.”
