LLMHigh
Perplexity AI Reportedly Misstated CLL Research, Allegedly Contributing to Delayed Treatment and Prolonged Suffering
- Occurred
- Jan 5, 2026
- Published
- Jan 25, 2026
- Source
- AI Incident Database
Summary
Joseph Neal Riley reportedly used Perplexity AI to self-diagnose a rare complication of chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) and, based on that output, allegedly delayed an oncologist-recommended Ven-Obi treatment for about a year. His son, Benjamin Riley, alleges that Perplexity misstated the medical research it cited, a conclusion he purportedly later confirmed with the study's authors.
Developers
- Perplexity AI
Deployers
- Perplexity AI
Harmed parties
- Joseph Neal Riley
- Benjamin Riley
- Epistemic integrity
- People seeking medical advice
Classification
Category confidence: 90%
Severity confidence: 85%
Rationale: LLM hallucination led to delayed medical treatment causing significant harm.
Classifier: Qwen/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-FP8