AI Research Boot Camp; Work Hour Protections Threatened? Redefining Measles Deaths

The following is a transcript of the podcast episode:

Rachael Robertson: Hey everybody! Welcome to MedPod Today, the podcast series where MedPage Today reporters share deeper insight into the week’s biggest healthcare stories. I’m your host Rachael Robertson.

I’m kicking off today’s episode with my reporting on a research boot camp that promises a finished journal submission in just 2 days. Then perspectives editor Jenny Friedman will talk about a recent op-ed on proposed rollbacks to resident work-hour protections. Finally, Kristina Fiore will share her reporting on a potential new definition for measles deaths and what that means for measles reporting. And of course, we will end the episode with our weekly update on how measles is spreading across the U.S.

But first, let me hand the microphone over to Kristina for this first segment.

Kristina Fiore: What if writing and submitting an academic paper didn’t take weeks or months, but instead could be done over the course of just one weekend at a premium hotel with plenty of snack breaks? That’s the promise a U.K.-based company called Research Boot Camp is making. Experts have some concerns about it, so Rachael will tell us more.

Okay, Rachael, so a paper in a weekend sounds way too good to be true. How exactly is the company saying this is possible?

Robertson: I think a lot of people would say that it isn’t or shouldn’t be possible. But the way this boot camp is doing it is by teaching participants how to use an artificial intelligence (AI) tool called Metysis that Research Boot Camp told me speeds up the slow groundwork of research. The whole weekend-long boot camp is built around learning Metysis and then using it to do a systematic review and meta-analysis.

Let me just read you how Research Boot Camp pitches this weekend on their website: Quote: “Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis in 1 Weekend. Not 6 Months … From orientation on Saturday morning to a journal-ready draft by Sunday evening — every hour is choreographed.”

This schedule has plenty of “premium” — they emphasize that — coffee breaks and catered meals, but actually writing the article doesn’t even begin until 2 p.m. on day 2, leaving participants only a few hours to do it.

Fiore: It sounds like there are some red flags there.

Robertson: Oh, absolutely. While the program is marketed as a masterclass of sorts, experts said that this design enables shoddy research. They told me that high-quality meta-analyses require someone with expertise to sift through and decide which studies make the cut, and that AI isn’t able to do that reliably yet.

Experts also pointed out that while Research Boot Camp promises a paper ready for journal submission, that’s kind of a hollow promise since that doesn’t indicate quality or likelihood of actually being published. Gideon Meyerowitz-Katz, PhD, who studies research fraud at the University of Sydney in Australia, told me that “It’s like me guaranteeing that you’ll be able to apply for American Ninja Warrior after a 2-day fitness camp — I’m not guaranteeing anything of actual value.”

Fiore: So are boot camps like this common?

Robertson: My sources said that there’s been growth in this field as researchers face the pressure to publish or perish. One expert said that it’s harder to prove wrongdoing in courses that charge for training rather than explicit authorship, like some paper mill operations do.

In a lot of ways, this particular boot camp ties into the larger trend of advancements in AI enabling people to produce mediocre research that’s flooding peer review. AI is increasingly being used in medical research, and the tools are a lot more sophisticated than they were even 6 months ago. It’s relatively easy for researchers to chuck a dataset into a large language model and quickly generate a kind of meaningless study. An influx of this mediocre AI-supported research can flood peer review without adding much to the literature, is what a lot of experts were saying to me.

Fiore: Yeah, and you did a great job with that story as well, so we should make sure we point readers to that one too. Great summary. Thanks so much, Rachael.

Robertson: Thanks, Kristina. I’ll take it from here, and we’ll talk to you again in just a couple minutes.

The Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education, or ACGME, proposed some changes to the standards that govern accredited residencies. Some of these proposed changes include eliminating the requirement that residents have 8 hours off between shifts and reducing the mandatory rest period after a 24-hour in-house call from 14 hours to 12. MedPage Today reported that story, but we also published an op-ed by resident physician Chloe Lee, MD, MPH, who had some thoughts on ACGME’s proposed changes. Perspectives editor Jenny Friedman is here to discuss Lee’s piece.

Jenny, let’s start with the obvious first question: Does Lee support ACGME’s proposed changes to the current work-hour protections?

Jenny Friedman: Definitely not. Upfront, Lee counters the obvious pushback that she knows she can expect when writing this op-ed. So she explained that she understands the importance of rigorous training, and she lays out her very demanding schedule. But then she goes on to highlight how fewer protections for residents who are clearly already working pretty hard creates a safety risk for both patients and trainees.

As a point of evidence, she points to the infamous Libby Zion case. So, if you’re not familiar, in 1994, the college student Libby Zion died from a fatal drug interaction, and it came out later that one of her clinicians, who was an intern at the time, had been awake for over 18 hours. So basically, Lee is pointing to this to help drive home the fact that exhaustion and sleep deprivation have really detrimental effects on physician performance and health.

Robertson: I saw a lot of posts on social media from physicians who similarly share those concerns about rolling back work-hour protections. In her piece, what did Lee cite as the arguments in favor of fewer limits?

Friedman: Well, Lee says that the purpose of residency training is to train competent, autonomous, and ethical doctors. You can probably all agree with that. We need trainees who learn to make really hard decisions under pressure, handle unpredictability, and manage any emergency effectively. So the argument goes that intensive work requirements lead to better trained doctors, and Lee really drives that home in her op-ed.

Robertson: But if we know that exhaustion can contribute to adverse patient outcomes, what may be motivating these proposed changes?

Friedman: Well, perhaps it’s a cynical take, and Lee definitely acknowledges this in her piece, but she points to the fact that residents are, well, cheap labor and pretty easy to take advantage of, given how competitive residency is and how much trainees are there to become doctors.

So basically, residency programs hold all the power and residents have limited ability to fight back, so why not use them for all they’re worth? At least, that’s how Lee views the proposed changes.

Robertson: Yeah, and it definitely generated some conversation in the comment section on our website. Thanks so much, Jenny.

Friedman: Thanks, Rachael.

Robertson: In the beginning of September, the CDC said it was working with the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists, or CSTE, on a new definition for measles deaths. Was that true? And if so, why was that happening? Kristina Fiore started looking for answers, and she’s here to tell us what she found.

Kristina, let’s start with the backstory. Why did the CDC make this announcement?

Fiore: In September, CDC Director Erica Schwartz, MD, MPH, JD, changed the number of measles deaths on the CDC’s website at the request of HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. It initially listed two measles-associated deaths recorded by Pennsylvania, but Kennedy asked Schwartz to remove them. In place of the number, they put an asterisk, and the related text stated that CDC is working with CSTE to “develop a standardized case definition for deaths due to measles.”

As you can imagine, that was the first that many people had heard that there was a new definition being worked on.

Robertson: Right, so you reached out to CSTE to confirm.

Fiore: I did, and they said yes, they’ve been working with the CDC since the summer to develop guidance for case investigations involving measles deaths. The CSTE spokesperson said this did not come at the request of the CDC. It’s a workgroup that they said is part of an established process that will work with CSTE leadership and the CDC.

Some CDC sources questioned why it’s coming up now, though. There were three measles deaths last year in 2025, did that prompt some kind of process? It seems that Kennedy wants to draw some kind of distinction between deaths from measles versus deaths with measles, as we heard very often during the COVID pandemic. But most experts now will tell you that deaths with usually wouldn’t have happened without the disease in the first place. It’s sort of like a tipping point moment.

One CDC source told me this: “It’s almost like the CDC wants to make it more difficult to count confirmed deaths.”

Robertson: When will we have a new definition of measles deaths?

Fiore: No one knows. It’s not clear how long this process is expected to take, or if it will end up substantially different than the current way that these deaths are defined. I get the sense that there will be a lot of pushback if there’s any attempt to make the definition as restrictive as possible.

Robertson: That sounds about right. Thanks, Kristina.

Fiore: Thanks, Rachael.

Robertson: Speaking of measles, there were 230 cases last week and 190 the week before that. Pennsylvania has the worst ongoing outbreak, with more than 200 cases in the last 2 weeks.

To see the full state-by-state breakdown, check out our measles map, which we have been updating at the top of each week since last December. Yep, measles has been a big problem in the U.S. for that long.

And that is it for today. If you like what you heard, leave us a review wherever you listen to podcasts, and hit subscribe if you haven’t already. I’ll see you again soon.

This episode was hosted and produced by me, Rachael Robertson. Sound engineering by Greg Laub. Theme music by Palomar. Our guests were MedPage Today reporters Rachael Robertson, Jenny Friedman, and Kristina Fiore. Links to their stories are in the show notes.

MedPod Today is a production of MedPage Today. For more information about the show, check out medpagetoday.com/podcasts.