You don't want to rely on a chatbot about concussion and traumatic brain injury related medical questions or for your insurance claim

A study published September 1, 2026 in Frontiers in Public Health, Zuo X, Zuo H, Zhang M and Zheng W (2026) Safety, accuracy, empathy, information quality, and readability of publicly accessible LLM-based chatbots for traumatic brain injury and concussion questions: a cross-sectional comparative study. Front. Public Health 14:1926980. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2026.1926980, put 65 common concussion and brain-injury questions to five AI chatbots — ChatGPT, Gemini, Copilot, DeepSeek, and Doubao — and had blinded experts rate all 325 answers.

While about 9 in 10 answers were rated safe, 27 answers were flagged as potentially harmful, and they failed in exactly the ways that matter most after a bike crash:

•  Telling people to stay home instead of going to the ER

•  Overly reassuring advice about imaging — "you're fine" without a scan

•  Clearing people to drive or return to activity or driving too soon

•  Not enough caution with children's head injuries

Not all chatbots performed the same and scored differently for across the metrics. Metrics included safety, accuracy, empathy, reliability and information quality, and readability. A chatbot may have done well for one metric while scoring more poorly on another metric.  

The researchers' conclusion: chatbots can supplement health information, but they should not replace professional medical evaluation, “… particularly for emergency symptoms, children, imaging decisions, and return-to-activity guidance.” This is because “TBI advice often involves time-sensitive decisions” and the content provided by chatbot can be complex and is not easy to understand, especially for brain injured patients who may be “anxious, cognitively fatigued, [or] symptomatic...”

Here's my take, after a bike crash it may be easy to wait and tell yourself everything is fine, and AI may wrongly agree with you.  Brain injuries are serious, and they can evolve over time.  Don’t rely on AI to diagnose your possible concussion or traumatic brain injury or recommend treatment next steps. An AI chatbot cannot replace a medical professional’s ability to assess you for things a computer and keyboard simply cannot, like how you physically appear, your speech, your pain, or your behavior.  

From a legal perspective, relying on a chatbot won’t cut it. You need a doctor's medical evaluation. The medical record from those first hours and days after a bicycle crash are important for any future claim for injuries and compensation. Without those early records documenting your symptoms, the insurance company is more likely to be able to claim the symptoms did not exist or weren’t that bad. It’s safer for your health and your claim for compensation to get your brain checked out by a qualified medical professional as soon as possible.

Have a question about your case?

Attorney Dan D'Angelo offers free consultations for brain injury and cycling accident victims throughout Colorado.

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