Get Started with #FOAMed

It is a wide misconception that #FOAMed is just for people interested in emergency and prehospital medicine. It is true that large areas of the movement are dedicated to those specialties, but there is a vast amount of other specialties that use #FOAMed to broadcast, discuss and develop ideas and improve their skills.

This guide is for all of you out there who want a bit of a helping steer towards discovering the #FOAMed movement for yourself. Maybe you wish to get involved in the 24h news cycle of your specialty, or perhaps you wish to contribute. In 2016, it could’t be easier.

1. It’s free.
2. It’s easy to use.
3. It’s the future of medical education

How to get started

1. Gettwitter. Sign up for a free account and use the #FOAMed tag to discover people to follow.
2. Get twitter on your phone. You’ll see updates from those you follow about your specialty.
3. Create a list (bookmarks) of your favourite blogs or websites that utilise #FOAMed.
4. Try to google #FOAMed and your specialty to see the results.
5. Use LinksMedicus website to find your specialty’s #FOAMed pages as well as other amazing links!
6. Involve yourself in conversations using the #FOAMed hashtag on twitter
7. Start conversations about anything medical using the #FOAMed hashtag and maybe #radiology for example
8. Invite colleagues to do the same - friendly faces with lots to add.
9. Put your presentations online using SlideShare or similar, it’s free. You can link to it on Twitter!
10. If you have lots of material or presentations, start a free blog on WordPress or similar and put it online!

Here are some more #FOAMed Search Tools
1. Google FOAM 
​2. FOAM for GP 
3. LITFL - Top Blog List
4. EM and CC Entire Blog List