I went to my Dr for five years with increasing fatigue and IBS like symptoms, before being diagnosed on emergency admission with jaundice with Stage 2b Pancreatic Cancer in December 2019. My tumour was wrapping my portal vein and I was told I had about 12 weeks to live.

I was ridiculously lucky and a surgeon was willing to try the extremely complex and dangerous 14-hour surgery that saved my life.

At no point in my diagnostic journey was I asked clearly about my poo. It floated. It had floated for a year or more at least. I didn't think it was anything to mention and nobody asked specifically. In fact, it was my pancreas starting to lose function meaning there was fat in my poo, making it float.

I am now on a mission to change the conversation to improve and save lives and am raising money to set up a charity called #ClueInTheLoo - the first fundraising will be used to set up the website, email addresses, and work with a consultant to build a business plan.

Purpose: To get people to look in the toilet, understand what healthy poo looks like, and feel confident to talk to medics about any concerns. This would increase the early diagnosis of life threatening diseases like pancreatic, stomach and bowel cancer, and of life limiting conditions like Crohn’s, Colitis, Coeliac, etc.

Three Objectives

1) Digestive Health Questionnaire : The development of a diagnostically useful questionnaire that can be downloaded, completed and taken to the Doctor, or completed in a GP reception – like the Fatigue Severity Score. This should be used when any patient complains of vague or digestive symptoms to ask plain and precise questions.

Actions: Work with a PHD student to develop a useful questionnaire appropriate for a reading age of 12, that is diagnostically useful. Train people on using it. Campaign to have the introduced in clinical settings.

2) Plain language about poo : Medics use euphemistic, unclear and assumptive questions when talking about poo. “Tummy troubles” and “has there been a change in your bowel movements?” need to be replaced with precise and plain questions about colour, form, frequency, consistency, behaviour, etc.

Actions: Research on the questions used and what people understand by them. Develop a ‘plain poo talk’ guide for medics and train them in using it.

3) Awareness of what healthy poo looks like : We want looking at your poo to be a normal part of understanding your health, like feeling breasts or testes for lumps. We want people to understand what the colour, consistency, and behaviour of their poo might be trying to tell them, and when and how to talk to a Doctor about it.

Actions: Recruit celebrity doctor for the campaign. Research whether people can spot poo symptoms. On pack promotions. Back of toilet doors, etc. School events programme.