Joachim Boldt

Joachim Boldt (born 1954) is a German anesthesiologist whose research career ended in a major case of scientific misconduct. He was long regarded as a leading specialist in intravenous fluid management and an advocate of hydroxyethyl starch, a colloid used to support blood pressure during surgery. From 2010, when he was suspended from the Klinikum Ludwigshafen, editors of many journals and his hospital examined his publications. They found studies lacking proper ethics board approval and false data in at least ten of ninety-one articles examined, and he lost his professorship at the University of Giessen in 2011. A 2013 meta-analysis showed that hydroxyethyl starch increases the risk of death and kidney injury in critically ill patients once his fabricated trials are excluded. By 2017 ninety-six of his papers had been retracted, and by 2023 the total reached 199, a record for a single author. The Medicine Atlas records him as an example of how fabricated evidence can distort clinical guidelines.