A very BMJ Christmas

December 16, 2014 6:54 AM

It’s that time of year again: the British Medical Journal‘s Christmas Edition is out, featuring some of the most hilarious research published since… well, since forever! All this week, Discover's Seriously, Science? will be featuring the best of this and past years’ BMJ Christmas Research Articles to get you in the holiday spirit. First up: Sword swallowing and its side effects

Current BMJ papers:
SearCh for humourIstic and Extravagant acroNyms and Thoroughly Inappropriate names For Important Clinical trials (SCIENTIFIC): qualitative and quantitative systematic study

Nintendo related injuries and other problems: review

Transmissibility of the Ice Bucket Challenge among globally influential celebrities: retrospective cohort study

A means of measuring serial changes in anal sphincter tone in patients with spinal cord compression

The Darwin Awards: sex differences in idiotic behaviour

Use of Google Translate in medical communication: evaluation of accuracy

Medical eponyms: taxonomies, natural history, and the evidence

Are “armchair socialists” still sitting? Cross sectional study of political affiliation and physical activity

Utility of Hippocrates’ prognostic aphorism to predict death in the modern era: prospective cohort study

An exploration of the basis for patient complaints about the oldness of magazines in practice waiting rooms: cohort study

posted by T.D. Strange (8 comments total)

While I know you shouldn't read the comments, the indignant protests of man-children on phys.org over the Darwin Award study amused me greatly. Sadly, I generally question the wisdom of phys.org to include comments, for they are rarely worth the pixels they imprint upon.
posted by bouvin at 7:43 AM on December 16, 2014

The criteria in the first "study" is pretty brilliant and I have seen quite a few terrible offenders in my day.
posted by Sophie1 at 7:56 AM on December 16, 2014 [1 favorite]

In case people don't R all the FAs (and really, there are a lot of them, so it's justifiable) it's important to highlight the Darwin Award study's hypothesis, which is, and I quote, "According to “male idiot theory” (MIT) many of the differences in risk seeking behaviour, emergency department admissions, and mortality may be explained by the observation that men are idiots and idiots do stupid things."
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 8:41 AM on December 16, 2014 [3 favorites]

We excluded cases in which injury was related to swallowing items other than swords, such as glass, neon tubes, spear guns, or jack hammers.

That seems only fair.
posted by Songdog at 8:59 AM on December 16, 2014

I always wonder why the Darwin Awards don't require proof that the recipient hasn't already procreated. And, thinking about it now, it should also require proof that the recipient doesn't have an identical twin still extant.
posted by birdsquared at 2:00 PM on December 16, 2014

"Acronym evaluation

The evaluation consisted of both positive...and negative (CHEATING, obsCure and awkHward usE of lettArs Trying to spell somethING) criteria"
posted by Bugbread at 11:02 PM on December 16, 2014

Thank god someone else did it this year.
posted by alby at 8:42 AM on December 17, 2014

The Ethics of Sarcastic Science: Every year the British Medical Journal publishes an issue of joke science. But years later, those papers are cited as real.
posted by homunculus at 1:16 PM on December 22, 2014