Conno Christou leaves nothing to chance. He tracks his sleep with a Whoop band, cross-references it with an Oura ring, and tests nearly 100 biomarkers each year. He has been doing annual blood tests for four consecutive years, following the protocols of longevity researchers such as Peter Attia and Rhonda Patrick. He was optimizing his supplements, circadian rhythm, and protein intake.
Having founded his second company at age 35, he had more access to the latest health research than anyone he knew. His last checkup in 2025 was green overall. “It was the best I’ve had in years,” he says.
Then, after exercising, my arms started to swell.
He didn’t think much of it at first. A week passed before he saw the doctor, who discovered two blood clots in his veins and scheduled surgery. But a pre-surgical exam changed everything. The doctor came back into the room and told him the surgery was not happening.
“I see a mass measuring 11x11x8 cm behind the sternum,” the doctor said.
The biopsy confirmed something Christou had never thought about before. He had an aggressive, fast-growing form of non-Hodgkin lymphoma. This is a rare diagnosis that affects approximately 1 in 420,000 people and is caused by a random genetic mutation unrelated to lifestyle, diet or stress.
The tumor was only present for about three months. In just three more weeks, you will reach Stage 4.
Christou spoke to this editor from his home in Athens this week, part-time. “My bad luck is good luck. “I got discovered because I went in to do something completely different.”
What followed was an education about the limitations of the health care system and what determined patients can do about them using the tools currently available.
His first oncologist, a renowned specialist, recommended the milder of the two chemotherapy treatments. Christou scheduled her first injection in three days. Then, the night before, he asked for a second opinion.
The second doctor did not hesitate. Citing Christou’s specific pathology, he recommended a more difficult regimen of continuous in-hospital infusions cycled every three weeks over six months. Light therapy brought his presentation success rate to about 60%. The offensive side pushed that figure to around 85%. Two world-class doctors. Directly opposite recommendations.
“As founders, we are at the wheel,” says Christou about why many people tend to accept what they are told, but many more should not. “You hear it a lot. You don’t have to take the first advice.”
He didn’t even decide to follow the second doctor’s advice. Over the next two days, he gathered a total of 12 opinions, using his professional network to reach out to hematologists and oncologists in the U.S. and abroad and asking for every favor he could. They voted 11 to 1 in favor of the more difficult path. He took it. He said the decision felt brave rather than logical. He was already a data-driven person, and now he felt there was a risk for him.
Over the course of more than six months of treatment, Christou approached chemotherapy the same way she approached building her company. Sprint marathons had a finite cycle and were filled with weekly data points. He did 25 months of mandatory service in Cyprus at the age of 18 and put that experience to good use as well. He told himself he would make a good soldier. Trust the process. 6th cycle. Get over it.
He wore the Whoop all over his body and found that it was very accurate in predicting when his immune system would hit rock bottom, sometimes even flagging symptoms before they appeared. He kept a symptom diary, using audio transcription to record every shift, every side effect, and every medication and prescription. He narrowed his focus to three variables: sleep, nutrition, and, above all, psychology. (“It moves the needle more than anything,” Christou said. “I have never asked, ‘Why me?’ Not once. There is no useful answer to that question.”)
He entered everything into Claude: blood results, scan data, wearable printouts, and journal entries. He is not alone in utilizing chatbots for medical guidance. A poll released in March found that one-third of American adults now use it for health information and advice. Stories online show that for some patients, AI is doing what systems cannot.
Experts urge caution. Danielle Bitterman, clinical director of data science and AI at Mass General Brigham, told the New York Times in recent months that general-purpose chatbots are often misleading and “haven’t been fully evaluated” for personalized diagnosis.
Christu disagrees. “It didn’t replace a doctor, but it helped me ask the right questions,” he says.
For his rare disease, which oncologists see once a year, accessing a model that has absorbed the entire medical literature is not like a simple Google search, he says.
This model has proven to be important at the end of treatment. His last PET scan (imaging used to detect active disease) yielded equivocal results. His oncologist began discussing a second treatment, potentially radiation therapy, near his heart and lungs. It was an amazing development.
Christou did his homework again. He had read that for this particular lymphoma, the false positive rate on PET scans after completion of treatment is about 60%. This is a statistic that still surprises him. “It’s 2026,” he says. “Sixty percent.”
He entered three PET scans and an MRI, all on Claude, which revealed a known but easily overlooked phenomenon. In patients younger than 40 years of age who are recovering from this type of lymphoma, the thymus may be reactivated after chemotherapy, causing active disease to appear on imaging. Taking into account his age and certain scan characteristics, the model set the probability of that explanation at approximately 90%.
He sought three more opinions. A fourth doctor confirmed that the thymus gland had rebounded. There was no active disease. No radiotherapy was necessary. He was clear.
Christou is still revealing what the past year has meant for her, including her health, how she works and how she thinks about time. He founded his current company, Keragon, before any of this happened. This is an AI-based platform that helps medical practices automate administrative operations.
But experiencing the system as a patient gave him a new perspective. He watched nurses and doctors buried in tasks that had nothing to do with care. He received the same chemotherapy protocol as the 80-year-old woman, but the side effects were managed through a series of additional medications, each causing its own problems. He says he’s confident we’ll look back on a time of healing and withdrawal.
He now rests mostly on Sundays. Whether he’s out for lunch with a friend or at home with his dog, he tries to attend to conversations that might have once felt like interruptions to work. A few years ago a VC friend told me that he continued to regenerate during treatment. Be happy now. He said it was one of the most difficult tasks, but he finally recognized its importance.
He said he would be happy to talk to anyone going through something similar, sharing notes and comparing experiences. He seems to mean it.
“It’s not going to happen in 10 years,” he says of what AI can already do for patients who want to use it. “That’s what’s happening today.”
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