A Florida man is suing OpenAI and CEO Sam Altman, alleging the company’s chatbot, ChatGPT, provided him with incorrect and “dangerous” medical guidance regarding a health condition that nearly became fatal.
According to the lawsuit, Scott Winters, a 55-year-old pastor, often turned to ChatGPT for medical advice when he experienced health symptoms. The suit alleges the chatbot eventually diagnosed Winters with dysautonomia, a nervous system disorder, and “developed a personalized recovery plan with specific instructions for Scott on how to heal his body.”
But on July 13, 2025, Winters experienced a “massive pulmonary embolism due to multiple blood clots in both of his lungs that brought him to the brink of death,” according to the lawsuit, which has been shared by multiple publications. Doctors’ notes later contradicted ChatGPT’s alleged diagnosis.
“I do not believe he has any dysautonomia (self-diagnosed from the internet),” one note read, according to the complaint.
The suit alleges that ChatGPT went beyond its scope by providing medical advice, and that the chatbot “should have escalated crisis safeguards and directed” Winters to medical personnel. Instead, it allegedly “dissuaded him from seeking that help and instead offered him unqualified diagnoses and personalized treatment plans,” which the suit alleges led to the “life-altering medical emergency.”
OpenAI spokesperson Drew Pusateri told CNET in part that “ChatGPT is not a doctor and should never be used as a substitute for medical care, diagnosis or treatment. Treating chatbots as the whole story behind people’s medical decisions or outcomes oversimplifies a much bigger challenge, and risks getting in the way of people accessing powerful new tools that can aid them in their health journey.”
According to the suit, the chatbot did at least on one occasion provide a disclaimer that read, “it is important to consult a healthcare provider to identify the underlying cause and receive appropriate treatment.” However, the suit alleges it subsequently began giving medical advice without a disclaimer.
“The lengthier Scott’s interactions with the tool, the fewer disclaimers it included in its messages,” the suit alleges. Winters is seeking financial damages based on these allegations.
Winters was using an older ChatGPT model, GPT-4o, which OpenAI has since retired due to concerns that the bot was too agreeable and could possibly cause harm. The same model was named in a separate lawsuit filed by a Canadian woman whose daughter died by suicide after interacting frequently with the chatbot. That case is still in litigation.
(Disclosure: Ziff Davis, CNET’s parent company, in 2025 filed a lawsuit against OpenAI, alleging it infringed Ziff Davis copyrights in training and operating its AI systems.)
AI and health advice
A recent study published in the scientific journal Nature Medicine found that when people interact with an AI chatbot for health diagnoses, it misses more than half of all medical diagnoses. This is despite the fact that large language models can now score comparably to passing the US Medical Licensing Exam on medical knowledge benchmarks.
The study notes that missed diagnoses may be at least partially attributed to users not providing enough information regarding symptoms.
According to a survey released in January and conducted by OpenAI itself, three in five US adults say they’ve used AI tools for health-related information in the past three months.
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