Lynn Faulds Wood
Lynn Faulds Wood (left), Rosie Winterton MP and Mike Hallworth at the LTO-UK launch event in June 2004
This article was last reviewed on
This article waslast modified on 28 April 2020.

Lynn Faulds Wood, who died of a stroke on 24 April at the age of 72, was a Scottish television presenter and journalist. She presented the consumer affairs programme Watchdog between 1985 and 1993 and the Lynn’ll Fix It consumer slot on GMTV from 2003 to 2009. She was diagnosed with stage 3 bowel cancer in 1991 and was found to be clear of the disease five years after surgery. That illness led her to use her training and personal experience to campaigning for better diagnosis and treatment of bowel cancer. She founded the charity Beating Bowel Cancer in 1997, followed by Lynn’s Bowel Cancer Campaign in 2003, and was also active at European level, co-founding the European Cancer Patient Coalition in 2003 (ecpc.org) with the motto “Nothing about us without us!”. Lynn was the first Chair of ECPC’s Steering Committee.

Lynn was a hugely effective patient advocate and an obvious choice to represent the voice of patients at the Launch Event for Lab Tests Online-UK on 16 June 2004. She joined Mike Hallworth (LTO-UK Chair 2002-2008), Rosie Winterton MP, then Minister of State at the Department of Health and Sue Hill (Chief Scientific Officer) at Richmond House in London to inaugurate the new website. Speaking at the event, Lynn said “Patients love to know what is being done to them, and they have a right to know. Lab Tests Online is a great way to find out!”

Stephen Halloran MBE, former Director of the South of England Bowel Screening Hub and founding editor of LTO-UK writes: “Lynn’s unexpected skirmish with bowel cancer death when 41 years old triggered a life-long commitment to help others avoid this all too common disease. She championed changes to lifestyle and nutrition, to early detection by awareness and screening and to the adoption of innovative treatments. Her initiatives, the charity Lynn's Bowel Cancer Campaign, and the European Cancer Patient Coalition have increased awareness and improved early treatment. Lynn’s enthusiasm, energy and the dogged determination, cultivated whilst a consumer champion as the Watchdog reporter/presenter, equipped her for a contribution from which so many have benefited.”

Lynn graduated from Glasgow University with an MA in languages and was awarded an honorary D.Litt. from Glasgow Caledonian University in 2004 for services to bowel cancer. She is survived by her husband, John Stapleton, also a journalist and broadcaster, and their son Nick.