I have long felt that Cureus is a very strange journal:
- It publishes an incredilby high volume of papers: ~50,000 in 2025.
- An unusual high percentage of these articles are on so-called alternative medicine (SCAM).
- Its article retraction rate seems one dimension higher than the average.
- It charges hefty fees for submissions needing language, formatting, or reference corrections.
- Estimates of its profits vary hugely: $3.5M revenue (Growjo), $1.4M (SignalHire), or $25-50M (Cience).
Now RETRACTION WATCH (RW) have reported that Clarivate has removed Cureus from its Master Journal List. The move means Cureus will no longer be indexed in Web of Science or receive an impact factor. Thus, researchers are less likely to submit to the journal.
Clarivate put indexing for the journal on hold last September for concerns about article quality, which the journal has been criticized for in the past. Cureus has retracted about 125 papers since Springer Nature acquired the title in late 2022. Last year, the journal closed six of its academic channels critics described as dressed-up paper mills, and has had to repeatedly retract plagiarized articles, as we’ve previously reported.
In August, Cureus eliminated author suggestions for peer reviewers in an attempt to decrease potential conflicts of interest. The journal has had authorship issues in the past, as RW previously reported. In 2021, a medical resident in New Jersey invited his wife to review his papers without disclosing their relationship, resulting in five retractions. In 2019, another author faked reviewer accounts for two well-known neurosurgeons and was discovered only after a routine editorial audit.
Rebecca Krahenbuhl, a communications manager at Clarivate, told RW a journal is removed from the Master Journals List when it “no longer meets” 24 quality criteria. These criteria include appropriate citations, adequate and effective peer review, and primarily original scholarly content, according to the company’s website. Krahenbuhl also told RW journals are typically on hold for an average of around six weeks, but in cases where publishers “engage” with Clarivate, the company allows journals to remain on hold for longer “to allow time for publishers to conduct their own investigations and take corrective action should they decide to do so.”
Graham Parker-Finger, the publishing director at Cureus, told us the journal was “very disappointed” in Clarivate’s decision and noted the journal would continue “to offer fast, affordable, trusted and quality-assured publishing for the global medical community.”
15 Responses to Cureus is a very strange journal!
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I’m glad you wrote this because it ties in with my own experience. I’m a CMML patient and a member of a Facebook support group for CMML patients. A little while ago one of the members posted a link to a paper in Cureus which suggested that CMML may be caused by the COVID vaccination. I did some investigation into Cureus which confirmed that it is not a respected or believable source of medical information, and I posted this on the Facebook group. The vast majority of repondents agreed with my view.
David…Here’s what ChatGPT says about that article in CUREUS…and it sounds like anyone of THIS skeptics list would consider that CUREUS published this case report and acknowledged its appropriate limitations. Would you now agree with what this AI says?
“Chronic Myelomonocytic Leukemia (CMML) is a rare blood cancer that overlaps features of myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS) and myeloproliferative neoplasms. It usually occurs in older adults and has an incidence of roughly 0.5 cases per 100,000 people per year.
Regarding the COVID-19 vaccines, the scientific literature shows very limited and mostly anecdotal evidence of any association with CMML. The situation can be summarized in three main points:
1. A few isolated case reports exist
There are rare case reports where CMML was diagnosed shortly after a COVID-19 vaccination.
One published report described a 74-year-old woman diagnosed with CMML shortly after receiving the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine.
The authors suggested that the vaccine might have “unmasked” an already developing CMML, meaning the disease likely existed before but symptoms appeared around the time of vaccination.
Importantly, the authors themselves stressed that more cases would be needed to establish any real association.”
Hi Dana. I’m not sure what point you’re making here, in particular I don’t know what you mean by “anyone of THIS skeptics list” The text you quote from ChatGPT sounds reasonable, although I haven’t reviewed it in detail.
They are operating a bait and switch model. I was attracted by their offer of free publication for a limited number of authors. They led me a merry dance with a succession of ridiculous demands for formatting changes. Eventually they said they would take over the editing for an inflated fee. It is a predatory journal which disguises itself, but the disguise is wearing thin.
For the record, the person who first introduced me to CUREUS and the person who encouraged ME to submit articles to them was GEORGE D. LUNDBERG, MD, former editor in chief of the JOURNAL OF THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION…and former editor at Medscape (amongst MANY other high honors!).
So, people HERE who are dissing CUREUS are also dissing some very substantial medical leaders.
Yeah…this is another SLAM DUNK.
And yet, I somehow expect people here to instead do new ad homs to me. When THAT Is ALL you have, you attack the messenger.
Big whoop.
The journal’s still an irrelevant rag and you’re still an insignificant halfwit.
Oh and somehow you forgot to mention that Lundberg was fired from JAMA in 1999 for jeopardizing the standards of the journal with a dubious article about students and oral sex. Substantial medical leader in your warped mind only, Dana. Nice company you keep.
Hey Lenny…
Oh yeah…and yet, MEDSCAPE still asked him to be their EDITOR. Let alone being so involved in the National Library of Medicine.
What are YOUR contributions to medicine? Absolutely NADA.
What a friggin’ hyper-biased pretend-scientist you are!
Unlike you, Dana, I’m a clinician – a practicing dentist, not a researcher but much as I hate to piss on your bonfire, I have contributed to a couple of published papers, one on diabetes and dementia and one on dental care and systemic health which, unlike anything you’ve ever had published, were published in very high-impact and highly-regarded journals and have been influential.
You remain the pathetic, laughable, scientifically ignorant and utterly inconsequential clown you always have been.
Oh Dana.. Medscape? This Medscape?
“In 2016 a survey of doctors found WebMD and its sister company Medscape to have incomplete medical information lacking depth and also numerous cases of misinformation on their sites A study of Medscape and WebMD also found both services to lack neutrality and exhibiting bias potentially based on very high payments (compared to their industry competitors) from the pharmaceutical industry.”
In 2012, Dr. Yoni Freedhoff, MD, Associate Professor of Family Medicine at the University of Ottawa and the medical director of the Bariatric Medical Institute, wrote an article entitled “Why I Can No Longer Trust Medscape”. In it he wrote that Medscape is “putting patients at risk by actively misinforming their physicians.”He also noted poor vetting of studies that Medscape chooses to publish as his reason for stating this.”
What a fine editor Lundberg obviously is.
You really should check there’s water in the pool before you jump in, knobhead.
Thank you MR DENTIST!
It is SO LAUGHABLE that you are a dentist…and you somehow claim that a homeopath is “not a clinician.”
You do live on another planet.
As for MEDSCAPE, here’s what ChatGPT says about them:
“1. Overall Reputation
Widely used clinical resource: Medscape is a large online platform providing medical news, drug information, clinical references, and continuing medical education (CME) for healthcare professionals.
It has millions of users and offers summaries of research, guidelines, and medical conference coverage.
Independent media-analysis groups rate it highly credible and “pro-science.”
Bottom line:
Doctors commonly use it as a quick reference or news source, not as the final authority on evidence.1. Overall Reputation
Widely used clinical resource: Medscape is a large online platform providing medical news, drug information, clinical references, and continuing medical education (CME) for healthcare professionals.
It has millions of users and offers summaries of research, guidelines, and medical conference coverage.
Independent media-analysis groups rate it highly credible and “pro-science.”
Bottom line:
Doctors commonly use it as a quick reference or news source, not as the final authority on evidence.”
SLAM DUNK AGAIN. It seems that those amalgam filliings has leeched mercury into your nervous system. It is no wonder that you are so vile…that is precisely the symptoms that mercury creates…but it will at least temporarily relieve your symptoms of SYPHILIS! #LOL!
Hey @DUllman,
Google AI disagrees with ChatGTP. What now? 😉
https://www.google.com/search?q=Criticisms+medscape&rlz=1C1GCEB_enDE1098DE1098&oq=Criticisms+medscape&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUyBggAEEUYOTIGCAEQRRg80gEJNTEwNmowajE1qAIIsAIB8QVzQ922_S8dZA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
Ah, Medscape and Chat GPT. Your two new favourites, Dana.
Does Chat GPT consider homeopaths to be clinicians?
“ ✅ Summary:
• Homeopath alone: considered an alternative practitioner, not a clinician.”
And what does Chat GPT say about Medscape’s conclusions on homeopathy?
“ ✅ In simple terms: Medscape presents the research literature but the evidence base it indexes concludes that homeopathy lacks proven clinical efficacy.”
You’re fond of the phrase “slam dunk” Dana. A slam dunk appears to be you tripping over your shoelaces and planting face-first into the court. What a pathetic, ignorant goon you are. It’s why you lack any credibility and why nobody pays you any attention. You can’t read, you can’t understand, you listen only to yourself, you repeatedly demonstrate your utter ignorance. It’s an ongoing amusement to witness. Shall we repeat again what Chat GPT says about you?
“ Mainstream scientific and medical communities do not treat him as a reliable authority on scientific evidence.
✅ In short: he is an activist and promoter of homeopathy, not a recognised expert in evidence-based medicine or scientific methodology.”
Run along, knobhead.
@Dana Ullman
So there can’t be anything wrong with Cureus because one distinguished doctor once advised you to take your quack publications there? Has it ever occurred to you that this doctor did not know that Cureus was a predatory operation?
Or maybe he knew you for the pseudoscientific charlatan that you are, so he pointed you to an appropriate publisher.
And even then, don’t you think it’s extremely implausible that a high-quality publishing house with just a handful of editors churns out 50,000 articles per year? Oh, wait, I forgot that ‘plausibility’ is one of your (many, huge) blind spots ….
Just for comparison: the BMJ publishes about 500 articles per year, out of ~8,000 submissions. And oh, even the quackery journal Homeopathy only publishes 50 ‘peer reviewed’ articles per year. So it’s fully justified to seriously question the quality as well as integrity of this Cureus journal, already for its ludicrous volume of articles alone.
Hey Richard,
If you actually did a modicum of research about Dr. George D. Lundberg, you would KNOW that he is on their editorial board! But you don’t do simple research, except explorations of your own back-side.
@Dana Ullman
So the man directed you to his own predatory publication mill. Ouch.
Funny how you succeed in making this George Lundberg look worse by the minute …