Q. You respond to an overhead page concerning an unresponsive patient (code). On arrival at the bedside, you find a 73-year-old male unresponsive. He is not your patient and you know nothing about his medical history or current regimen. Staff advise you he was admitted yesterday for exacerbation of long-standing congestive heart failure (CHF), and they are in the process of retrieving his current medication list. The patient is being monitored, and vital sign readings demonstrate blood pressure 90/50 mm Hg, heart rate 320/min, respiratory rate 10/min, and an oxygen saturation of 85 percent on 2L of oxygen via nasal cannula. The rhythm strip on the monitor reveals a rapid, irregular tracing with no clear P waves, T waves, or QRS complexes. Suddenly, the alarm on the cardiac monitor begins to sound, and the rhythm tracing now appears as a flat line with no apparent electrical activity. You quickly auscultate the patient’s chest and hear no heart sounds, which you confirm by palpating the radial artery in his wrist and feeling no pulsation. You immediately order cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) chest compressions to be initiated. What is the next most appropriate step in the management of this patient?