I presume that the International Journal of Surgery Case Reports is a real, peer-reviewed journal rather than a complete fake, as this paper is listed in PubMed Central and the journal in the University of Chicago online journals. You can see the paper by clicking on the weird title below, or download the pdf here; if the paper disappears just ask me for it.
I suspect that this was written by AI given the quote below, which sounds stilted, but perhaps the authors, from France and Germany respectively, may just write English that way. Either way, you be the judge.
It is not an April fool joke as it was published in September, and although the introduction (below) mentions that the Saturnians, who came from Earth, introduced both the terrestrial systems of private and public healthcare, my notion that this paper would really contrast them here and take a position was dispelled.
The references and authors’ locations
The first part of the three-page letter:
We practice Neurosurgery on SATURN in a country called « ILLUSIONLAND ». 60 million homo sapiens sapiens who live in this country migrated 30 years ago from the Earth. According to anatomical data, there is no difference between terrestrial and Saturnian homo sapiens sapiens. Modern medical and surgical technology has also been imported from Earth. The Saturnians of earthling descent of the earth-lings have roughly kept the same way of life, society, habits, etc. they inherited from their earthly ancestors.
In our country, ILLUSIONLAND we have two health systems. Private independent doctors and government-employed doctors who practice in hospitals. We present two clinical cases of the practice of Neurosurgery on SATURN. The main difference between the cases on Saturn with clinical cases on Earth is that on Sa-turn, both doctors’ and patients’ clinical cases are simultaneously presented.
1.1. Saturnian clinical case 1
1.1.1. First part
Doctor D.P. 52 terrestrial-year-old male (Saturnian 1 year 10 months old), obtained his doctoral degree of specialization at the age of 29 and was recognized as the second for its promotion in Medical School. As a young neurosurgeon, he is as active as when he was a resident and passed his fellowship. He operates every day, visits many patients during the day, and stays late at the hospital. He always offers to cover his colleagues’ on-call shifts if they have difficulties. He holds three master’s degrees and a Ph.D. He writes medical papers. He attends different congresses and seminars. As an example, he takes the Saturnian rocket to participate in the annual conference of the world Saturnian Federation of Neurosurgeons which takes place in “Utopia” the country located 200,000 km from his workplace. He is curious and wants to know everything about everything in his profession, especially about new surgical techniques. He asks his hierarchy about their experiences. He wants to participate in all the surgeries. In general, he stays in the hospital until 10 p.m. To have time to read an article or two, he quickly grabs a sandwich for lunch instead of going to the canteen. At home, even in bed, he thinks of cases he has seen during the day (Saturnian day which lasts only 10 h 30). When his secretary or a colleague from the emergency room calls him for a patient, he says: “Add them to my patient’s list. I’ll see them” so the consultation which officially lasts 4 h lasted 6 h sometimes 7 h. His colleagues know that they can count on him to take a night’s call or take care of an additional patient because he does this with joy.
Today, 23 years after (10 Saturnian months) Professor D.P. realizes that he is married and has two children, but he knows nothing about them. He does not even remember any details of his marriage. He just remembers that reading medical papers on his own was the best moment of his rare holidays with his wife. Today, he realized progressively that surgery makes him more tired, physically, both mentally. Today, unlike 20 years ago, when there is a new addition to the consultation list, he grumbles and answers the secretary with this leitmotif: “Is it really urgent? Is it a matter of neurosurgery? or as usual the guy has boo-boos and he comes to piss us off!”
Any explanations from readers?
Addendum by Greg Mayer
The paper has already drawn attention on PubPeer. The following query was posted:
Could the authors and the journal explain the rationale behind the publication of this ‘case study’?
The authors replied, beginning with
This paper possesses a symbolic nature.
and went on from there, including the statement that “science” encompasses “human sciences”, which are not restricted to
the study of molecules, statistical figures, false negatives, false positives, clinical trials, biological aspects, or specific p-values such as 0.003, as well as percentages, meta-analyses, or observations made under a microscope.
Another commenter, tongue firmly in cheek, applauds that
At least informed consent was obtained from all participants. No violations of research ethics on Saturn.
The authors, in a second reply, say their paper focuses on situations that are “fictitious.” You can’t make this stuff up, folks!
I think the paper is neither a fake (intended to get the authors publication credit for nonsense), nor a hoax (seeing what nonsense can get published), nor a parody (making fun of someone else’s nonsense by mimicking it). Rather, it is akin to science fiction, using an imaginary situation to explore real world situations. A case report journal, though, is certainly an odd place for such fiction!
1996 Sokal affair was just the start. Fake papers are raining in from everywhere (try googling fake academic papers) and AI amplifies the flood.
Is the journal even a serious journal, or one of those predatory journals that will publish anything for a fee? It did come out thru Elsevier, but I don’t know if they produce those sorts of journals.
Look up the journal Chaos, Solitons and Fractals. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elsevier#Chaos,_Solitons_&_Fractals
Elsevier has some good journals, but also many pay-to-play journals of extremely low quality. (At least some of the good ones are also pay-to-play.) The idea seems to be to collect money from people publishing there, riding on the coattails of the better journals. There is also the issue that the costs are inflated, that one sometimes has to subscribe to bundles, that one can’t cancel a subscription without losing access to old content, and so on. (Springer is similar but not quite as bad.)
My view: unless the only serious journals in the field in which you are publishing are with Elsevier or Springer, even publishing in their good journals is part of the problem.
Obviously the Deep State is covering up the colonization of Saturn begun under the Clinton administration, in coordination with the Illuminati.
I think you’re onto something! 😉
The Rand Corporation, in conjunction with the saucer people, under the supervision of the reverse vampires, are behind it. We’re through the looking glass here, people.
I think that the authors are performing a Sokal-like hoax but do not admit it (yet). The journal has Q3 but seems to have no impact factor.
Thinking of the ordeals I and my colleagues have with publishing quite real and Earthly research, I wonder whether to laugh or to weep.
A revealing question.
So the authors seem to want to prompt a peer discussion on the way life can grind down youthful idealism and enthusiasm into cynicism and callousness. Okay. Group therapy can be fun. But if they were trying to be clever by using a veil of fiction to share their truth, they still had work to do.
WTAF?! Apart from the all round weirdness there’s a strange typo (“perfume” where “perform” is meant). I struggle to understand how or why this manuscript was accepted and published.
This is the gold standard for such things in our field:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/0167278985901733
That one’s funnier!
Also Elsevier.
Reads lik what I should submit in response to the invitations from spurious, predatory journals.
I think this is one of those garbage journals that I continually get manuscript submission requests from, despite that I’m not even an MD let alone a surgeon. A lot of them end in Case Reports.
The aus may have gotten pissed and submitted it in retaliation to getting spammed by them, and if that’s the case, bravo!
My first thought is that Ray Bradbury wrote this kind of thing much more convincingly in “The Martian Chronicles”, back in 1950.
I notice that in the author contribution section, there’s this gem:
“Dr Keyvan MOSTOFI: Conception, writhing, validation”
Good for Dr Mostofi. Nobody gets enough credit for the writhing involved in scientific research these days.
It has to be read to be believed. Or, I guess, not believed. The part about the doctor having an argument with his wife before surgery is precious. It’s somewhere on the edge of genius and insanity.