Nearly 3,000 peer-reviewed medical papers have fake citations, AI-assisted audit finds

AI justification

The institutional action of exposing fake citations protects scientific integrity and public trust. | The audit itself is a positive institutional action that upholds scientific integrity and SDG 4 (Quality Education) by identifying and exposing fraudulent citations. However, the underlying issue of widespread fake citations in peer-reviewed medical papers represents a severe breach of trust in scientific literature, with potential long-term harm to evidence-based medicine and policy.