Starbucks Pungmu Station DT Supervisor Ha Hyo-jin, center, holds an honorary recognition from the Gimpo Fire Station in front of the station in Gyeonggi Province, Thursday. The store’s deputy manager Jung Tae-woo, left, and another supervisor from the store, Park Ji-hoon, second from left, pose with officials from the station. Courtesy of Starbucks Korea
Gimpo fire authority recognizes prompt CPR response
By Ko Dong-hwan
Employees of a Starbucks shop in Korea were honored by the country’s firefighting and emergency rescue agency for saving a customer’s life.
The Gimpo Fire Station in Gyeonggi Province on Thursday bestowed a special recognition, under the station’s chief, to three employees of Starbucks Pungmu Station DT in Gimpo.
The employees were honored after an incident on Jan. 26, when a Starbucks visitor suddenly fell to the ground while waiting in line to place an order. Ha Hyo-jin, a store supervisor who was taking orders, wasted no time helping the customer, who was losing consciousness. Ha then performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). The employee’s emergency response took less than eight seconds, Starbucks Korea said.
Jung Tae-woo, the shop’s deputy manager, then called Korea’s emergency number and, together with Park Ji-hoon, another supervisor who had just arrived for his shift, continued CPR on the customer.
The three continued their efforts until the emergency crew arrived eight minutes later.
A member of the fire station emergency crew said the Starbucks employees were “performing CPR perfectly, placing repeated pressure to the chest just as how it was supposed to be done,” within the golden time — the first four to five minutes after the patient starts to lose consciousness.
“That patient was in a state of ventricular fibrillation when we took over,” said Lim Ji-seong, an emergency responder. Ventricular fibrillation is more commonly known as arrhythmia, or irregular heartbeat.
“We used an external defibrillator on the patient three times and saw the cardiac rhythm coming back to normal. If an initial life-saving emergency manual is kept, the chances of saving lives rise dramatically,” Lim added.
Fire authorities said they would recommend Park as a Heart Saver, a designation by Heart Saver Korea. They added that because Park performed CPR on the patient for six minutes before the emergency crew’s arrival, he allowed the patient to recover his heart’s rhythm and regain consciousness and full control of bodily functions in the first 72 hours or longer since being taken to a hospital — conditions required to earn the title.
Starbucks Korea said the company regularly hosts workplace safety education sessions and has emergency life-saving manuals readily available. It added that it trains employees with measures necessary for catering to customers, including CPR, which is not legally required for private companies in Korea.
