Niamh Shackleton
A 27-year-old woman has revealed that ChatGPT played a part in diagnosing her with blood cancer.
Marly Garnreiter initially thought her night sweats and itchy skin were caused by anxiety and grief after losing her dad Victor, 58, to colon cancer.
She was also losing weight, so decided to put her symptoms into ChatGPT.
"I started to lose a lot of weight when he'd just passed away," she recalled.
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"I kept eating normal amounts of food but I thought it must be the anxiety making me lost a lot of weight.
"I'd accepted you lose weight with grief."
Victor passed away in January 2024 after he was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2022.
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Marly, a strategist, from Paris, France, explained that her symptoms came about shortly after and she saw a doctor for some blood tests but they all came back clear.
Her doctor agreed that it was the grief giving her these symptoms, but as time passed Marly began to question if there was something more to it.
She explained: "I felt I was processing the grief well. I thought it must be something.
"In May I sent a video to my friends, I had asked ChatGPT and it said I had blood cancer.
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"I ignored it. We were all skeptical and told to only consult real doctors."
But after constantly fatigued and getting a pressure in her chest, she went to see her GP again in January 2025.
Marly said: "Around Christmas time I started to feel something was wrong. I had a constant pain in my chest. I was tired all the time."
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Her GP discovered a 'big mass' on her left lung and went on to refer her to a pulmonologist.
After they took a biopsy, Marly was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma - a type of blood cancer - on February 10, 2025.
Speaking about her devastating diagnosis, she admitted: "I felt a lot of anger. I felt like everything was unfair.
"I didn't want my family to go through this one more time."
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Marly had a chance to do an egg retrieval so she could freeze her eggs before starting her treatment.
She said: "I'm feeling confident for the future. It's really important to listen to our bodies.
"Sometimes we tend to lose our connection with our inner self. It's important to be in tune."
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Marly started chemo on March 1 and will have four to six cycles.
If you’ve been affected by any of these issues and want to speak to someone in confidence, contact the American Cancer Society on 1-800-227-2345 or via their live chat feature, available 24/7 every day of the year.
If you have experienced a bereavement and would like to speak with someone in confidence, contact GrieveWell on (734) 975-0238, or email [email protected].