FOAM Impact: The Influence of Open-access Medical Education on Practice Uptake.

Objectives: The FOAM Impact study sought to examine baseline rates of intravenous (IV) lidocaine usage for the treatment of renal colic and to compare rates of use between FOAM utilizers and nonutilizers. We sought to measure the effect of FOAM resources on clinical practice by timing the release of FOAM content with publication of the LIDOKET trial.

Methods: A cross-sectional before-and-after survey was conducted and disseminated on two social media platforms.

Informed consent for invasive procedures in the emergency department.

Background: Informed consent for procedures in the emergency department (ED) challenges practitioners to navigate complex ethical and medical ambiguities. A patient's altered mental status or emergent medical problem does not negate the importance of his or her participation in the decision-making process but, rather, necessitates a nuanced assessment of the situation to determine the appropriate level of participation. Given the complexities involved with informed consent for procedures in the ED, it is important to understand the experience of key stakeholders involved.

Public interest in gun control in the USA.

To characterise public interest in gun control in the USA using internet search queries, we undertook a cross-sectional study of the relative popularity Google Trends searchers for 'Gun Control', 'Second Amendment', 'National Rifle Association' and 'Mass Shooting' from May 2015 to December 2018. 740 weeks of data were queried. Graphed data revealed nine major inflection points.

Financial relationships with industry among guideline authors for the management of acute ischemic stroke.

Objective: To characterize the prevalence of industry relationships among authors of acute ischemic stroke (AIS) guidelines and its association with graded evidence.

Methods: A cross-sectional study of five policy papers on AIS published by the American Heart Association (AHA)/American Stroke Association (ASA), American Academy of Emergency Physicians (AAEM), and American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP). Financial conflicts of interest (FCOI) data were obtained using the Open Payments Database for the years 2013 through 2017.

Refractory Ventricular Fibrillation Successfully Cardioverted With Dual Sequential Defibrillation.

Background: Current guidelines for the treatment of adult patients in cardiac arrest are supplied by the American Heart Association through basic life support and advanced cardiovascular life support (ACLS) provider courses. When treatments defined by the ACLS guidelines are unsuccessful in terminating a lethal dysrhythmia, the use of alternative strategies may prove useful. In this case, two defibrillators were used to deliver a greater than normal energy waveform over an extended time interval to return a patient to a normal sinus rhythm.