A new benchmark for evaluating patient-facing health AI agents

When a virtual patient in a benchmark scenario tells an AI agent they're feeling feverish, or hopeless, the difference between a safe response and an unsafe one often comes down to clinical design — not just medical knowledge. As healthcare AI shifts from answering questions to completing tasks on behalf of patients — scheduling visits, managing prescriptions, triaging symptoms — we need benchmarks that measure what actually matters: whether these systems keep patients safe, follow clinical workflows, and help patients accomplish their goals across realistic, multiturn conversations. Primary care already guards against diagnostic errors, unsafe medication use, and gaps in follow-up; an agent acting on a patient's behalf should be evaluated on how it handles the same risks. Today we're sharing PatientAgentBench, a…