60-Year Old Man’s AI Diet Backfires, Leads To Rare 19th-Century Diagnosis

A 60-year-old man went in search of a modern aid to his own health and found an individual diet plan using the artificial intelligence ChatGPT chatbot. Being an unnamed man, he wanted to find an easy and fast solution to lose some weight and feel more alive. After he followed the detailed, week-by-week diet created by the chatbot, he excised several major categories of food, such as fruits and most vegetables, because he assumed the AI was guided by advances in nutritional science.

But after a few months on the restrictive diet however, he started feeling unexplained fatigue, began bleeding at the gums and bruising. When he visited his physician, the physician made a shocking diagnosis: scurvy, a disease most well known during the 19 th century most often in sailors and Vitamin C deficiency.

The Dangers of Unverified AI Health Advice

This troubling example shows why use of large language models such as ChatGPT to find health and wellness information is inherently dangerous. Although the AI is able to synthesize tons of information, it cannot comprehend subtle needs of an individual, medical history or even the principles of biology of the human kind. In this case, the diet offered by the chatbot lacked all the necessary vitamins and minerals, especially the vitamin C, which is vital in collagen synthesis and general wellbeing.

The over-reliance on the new technology at the expense of basing their judgment on the knowledge of the experienced advice expert in the field demonstrated the man had made a mistake, showing the evidence that AI is a wonderful tool but cannot be used as a replacement of the face consultation with a medical expert.

A Modern Case of a Historical Disease

Bromism was at one time nevertheless prevalent in late 1800s and early 1900s when bromide salts were used to treat everything from headaches to anxiety problems. It was at one time used so frequently that it was responsible for an up to 8 percent of psychiatric hospital admissions. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration banned bromide from ingestibles between 1975 and 1989 so modern cases are unusual.

The bromide will accumulate in the body together with time creating symptoms of neurological, psychiatric affect, or just dermatological symptoms. Here the patient’s bromide levels were an unbelievable 1700 mg/L  more than 200 times over the upper limit reference range.

Also Read: Apple iPhone 17 Pro Max Launch Date: The Future Of Smartphones Is Here With Smarter Features, Sleeker Design, And Power Like Never Before!