A 43-year-old with colon cancer used AI in 3 ways to help make treatment a little easier

• Russ Read-Barrow was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer after seeing blood in his poop.
• Using Claude, he built a chemotherapy symptom tracker to help him recall what made him feel better.
• Read-Barrow asks AI to create a summary of his health history for new medical providers.

Russ Read-Barrow has been living with incurable stage four colon cancer for five years.

The 43-year-old former PR director and father of two from the UK was diagnosed with the disease in 2021. After seeing blood in his poop around six times over the course of a few weeks, he got a colonoscopy.

With multiple rounds of chemotherapy and surgeries to remove cancerous cells from his colon, liver, and later his lungs, Read-Barrow's doctors have stopped the cancer from spreading further since 2022. He still needs regular chemotherapy, roughly every three months, to slow cell division and prevent further growth in his lungs and liver.

"The chemo I'm having now is doing a good job of keeping it under control, but at some point that'll change and I'll have to have something else," Read-Barrow told Business Insider.

Over the years, Read-Barrow has experimented with using AI to help manage the symptoms, medications, and emotional challenges that have become part of his life. In 2025, he launched a side project called FcancerwithAI, a blog where he shares his story and the AI cancer tools he's built.

"I'm not saying AI is going to cure cancer. I'm saying it's going to help me remember what my consultant said, spot patterns in my side effects, and maybe give me back some control in a situation where control is basically an illusion," he wrote in a blog post.

He hopes that by sharing what has helped him, he can help others, as rates of colon cancer cases in those under 50 have risen since the mid-1990s, making it the deadliest cancer in this age group. However, if spotted early, the survival rate for colon cancer is high, meaning, like Read-Barrow, more and more people are living with cancer as a chronic illness.

Here are three ways Read-Barrow has used AI to manage his ongoing cancer treatment.

Chemotherapy symptom tracker

Russ-Barrow will need chemo for the foreseeable future. Afterwards, he typically experiences side effects like fatigue, nausea, and changes to his mood and sleep habits, which can be hard to cope with.

"The hardest part day-to-day is trying to manage the energy windows I do have," he said.

He started recording a 30-second voice note chronicling his symptoms each day following chemo, and wearing a WHOOP health tracker. He did this for three cycles of chemo and plugged his information into Claude to spot patterns in how he felt and what exacerbated or eased symptoms. "I found it really useful," he said.

The data showed that by around day four after his treatment, he would go from feeling relatively normal to exhausted. "If you see that over time happening again and again, you can sort of deal with it better because you know it's going to come and you don't think, 'Oh God, what's happening?'" he said.

Subsequently, he started asking the AI to pick out 10 things he should remember before starting his next round of chemo. One of the things it reminded him was that an anti-nausea medication he tried had helped.

"You don't keep a record, you won't remember. You think you will, but give it three months and life will take over and you won't," he said.

A medical history research assistant

Read-Barrow uploaded all of his medical records to Gemini Notebook (formerly Notebook LM). The AI is designed to answer questions, spot trends, and create content such as presentation decks based only on files the user uploads.

He uses it as a "centralized hub" for all of his medical records, which means he can access test results, doctor's notes or any other medical data within seconds.

"It saves me from the massive admin headache of digging through folders every time I see a specialist," he said.

Getting new people up to speed

When signing up for a gym, getting a treatment such as a massage, or seeing any kind of doctor, they typically ask for your medical history. However, when you have a complex chronic illness like cancer, that history can be lengthy and painful to recount.

He found a solution by asking Gemini Notebook to summarize his health history in 500 words, which he can pass on.

Read-Barrow is aware that not everyone would feel comfortable sharing so much personal information with AI platforms, but for him, the benefits outweigh the risks. "I've got terminal cancer. What's the worst that can bloody happen?" he said.