Can academic satire exist in the age of “fake news?” Tracking the citation record of a “holiday review” paper

Nine years ago, I published an article in the holiday review issue of the Canadian Medical Association Journal (CMAJ) entitled “Cigarette smoking: an underused tool in high performance endurance training.”1 I was a medical student at the time, and the article was meant to illustrate the potential perils of non-systematic review articles. I attempted to take a light hearted approach, cherry picking articles and taking findings out of context, in order to make what I thought was a ridiculous argument. At the time I was mildly concerned that some people might take the article seriously; the abstract was clear, however, that this was not a sincere thesis, and clearly explained the underlying message of the paper. “SATIRE” was even written in large font at the top of the first page.

Initially, the paper was well received, and I was pleased to …