Daniels was going about his duties at The Springs at Boca Ciega Bay earlier this month when he heard someone scream. An elderly man had started choking, and the man’s wife had screamed for help.

            By the time Daniels had run across the room, a female staffer had begun applying the Heimlich Maneuver, but the man, who was a patient at the facility, continued to choke.

            “She was trying to apply the Heimlich while the man remained seated in his chair,” Daniels said, “but the Heimlich works much better if you can get the person into a standing position.”

            Daniels, 40, got the man up into a standing position and started re-applying the Heimlich. After several minutes, the food that had lodged in the man’s throat popped out, and he began breathing again.

            “I could see that the man had very weak reflexes,” Daniels said, “and it ended up taking two or three minutes to get him breathing normally.”

            “We are all so very proud of him, and you all should be very proud of the quality of students you are preparing for the health care world,” Jean M. Burke, Rehab Director at The Springs at Boca Ciega Bay, said in an e-mail to Rebecca Kramer, Program Director at SPC’s Physical Therapy Program.

            Daniels, a second-year student in the program, was performing a clinical assignment at the facility when the incident took place. He said that learning CPR and the Heimlich Maneuver are part of his training. 

            Daniels has worked in the medical field for the past 15 years as an aide, and he said this wasn’t his first experience with the Heimlich Maneuver.

            “I think this was Number 6,” Daniels said. “All of them have been successful. The last one was a 250-pound amputee, and that was hard because I had to stand him up. But that one was successful, too.”