He's best known for hunting down cowboy builders or exposing wrongs on tv programmes such as Fake Britain, but Dominic Littlewood nearly faced his own disaster - at least twice.
The distinctive accent of TV's Caught Red Handed Dom can usually be heard handing out warnings on consumer shows, however the Essex born celeb's real life medical dramas equal the tension of any of his onscreen stories.
At the age of just 24 his career was nearly cut short after an accident during a holiday to Australia.
Starting his first job at 14 - a school holiday gig with a travelling fair - Dom has never been afraid to graft. "I've worked hard all my life," he says. "But money was never my priority. I work because I love getting up and doing something positive."
His CV spans everything from on-board repairing team member for Thames sailing barges, to car salesman, presenter and even 2012 Strictly Come Dancing contestant.
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However, while he works hard, he also plays hard, and it was a Friday the 13th holiday jape that nearly changed his path.
Dom says he was backpacking with a mate across Australia at the time. He told the Mirror: "My friend Ryan and I were showing off to some women on the beach on Great Keppel Island, just off the Great Barrier Reef.
"I put my foot in Ryan’s hand and he flipped me up into the air. I landed on my head in a foot of water, snapping my neck".
He didn't go to hospital until 28 hours later where he was told he had broken his neck. "I didn't know if I'd be able to walk again," he says. "I stayed another month before being flown home for my operation. I've never known pain like it."
After flying home, he underwent an operation to remove a piece of hip bone and then three vertebrae were fused together using the bone and wire.
Dom's surgery left him in a body brace. Doctors advised him to rest for six months but he says: "I was back at work two weeks later... I can't sit still and do nothing."
But this isn't the first time Dom has faced an emergency.
As a child, he was diagnosed with Type 1 diabetes. The diagnosis followed a holiday in Devon with his parents and brothers and sisters when he became dangerously ill.
"I remember the exact day I was diagnosed – August 11, 1975," he told the Mirror. "I was 10. My weight dropped to 4st and my mother knew something was seriously wrong. Initially, she thought I was dying of leukaemia."
Dom has learned to live with his diabetes and says he injects insulin at least four times a day but has to keep a check on his levels.
He recalls in 2003, while visiting his sister Teresa in Hong Kong, he suffered a serious hypoglycaemic attack. It was during the night in his hotel room.
He says: "The eight-hour time difference had confused my body, and in that situation, you need to check insulin levels more often until your body adjusts.
"One of the side effects of having an attack is that I sweat profusely.
"The combination of that and having air-conditioning on meant my body temperature decreased rapidly. I tried calling hotel reception but the lady put the phone down because I was spouting rubbish.
"Eventually, I managed to press redial on my mobile and ring my sister. Realising immediately that I was in trouble, she rushed over. By the time she arrived my lips were blue, my body was shaking and I was in desperate trouble.
"At the hospital, a doctor put a digital thermometer in my ear but it didn’t register. Technically, I was clinically dead!"
Such dramatic medical experiences haven't curtailed Dom on the work front though.
"You learn to live with diabetes," he said. "I enjoy my TV work but it does make the condition harder to control, especially when I’m up and down the country and can’t eat at regular times.
"In 2007, I was on Strictly with dancer Lilia Kopylova. I remember dancing with Lilia in a gym when a woman from the TV crew asked me to check my blood sugar levels. I stopped dancing and told her everything was fine. But she asked again, so I did.
"To my surprise, they were extremely low – close to the point where you can slip into a coma. I was given sugary drinks and lay on the floor until I recovered.
"Later I asked how she knew, and she replied: “I’m a bit embarrassed to say it, but it’s the first time ever that it looked like you could dance!”
After a serious accident and diabetes, you'd think Dom has had his fair share of medical setback, but in 2012 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer after going for a routine blood test.
Having lost both parents to cancer, doctors advised him to freeze his sperm before performing an operation to remove his prostate glands.
But since then, the man who made his TV debut as a contestant on BBC dating show, The Other Half, has gone on to clock up numerous TV roles.
The now 57-year-old even made an appearance on Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway in March 2022
Speaking about how he got into consumer goods TV, Dominic told Express in 2016: "I consider myself to be a really honest, straightforward person.
"If anything isn’t right I will try and put things right. I took three companies to claims court before I was 25 for not doing their job properly. I won all the cases and learnt a lot. "
- If you need advice about diabetes visit www.diabetes.org.uk
