Eric Ross, M.D., assistant professor of psychiatry

(FEBRUARY 10, 2023) Eric Ross, M.D., assistant professor of psychiatry, shared what he described as “oddities” he noticed in two studies of antidepressant therapies by a team of researchers in Egypt with the journals that had published the studies. Now, almost a year later, one paper has been pulled and the other is still under review.

Both studies had impressive results, suggesting that in just a couple of years, the Egyptian researchers had discovered two treatments—metformin and cilostazol—that outperformed electric shock therapy. It didn’t take Ross long to conclude the data was fake.

Ross, who at the time was doing his residency in psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, said, “It’s been almost a year at this point since I originally raised the issue. I don’t think this was one where it took a lot of, you know, complex sleuthing, like doing statistical analysis or anything like that, to be very suspicious about these papers. So I certainly would have hoped it would have been done a lot sooner.”