Surrounded by her family, the 41-year-old Kilkenny woman died at Our Lady's Hospice, Harold's Cross, Dublin, on Friday night after a long battle with cancer.

After waiting seven months for a colonoscopy, Long was diagnosed with terminal bowel cancer in March 2006. Had she had the test within three days, as she discovered private patients were able to do, her cancer might have responded to treatment. Instead she had chemotherapy and three abdominal operations to no avail.

In an interview with the Sunday Tribune last month, Long spoke of her outrage at the delay and her determination to prevent the same thing from happening again.

"I will die within the next couple of months, " she said. "Hopefully other people might live because of what I did."

After her Liveline interview, St Luke's Hospital in Kilkenny, where she was treated, was granted funding for a new 24-bed daycare service. It is due to open next year and will be dedicated to her.

Liveline's Joe Duffy yesterday spoke of his "immense sadness" at Susie's death. "She was one of the most remarkable people I ever met. . . it was the two-tier health system that killed her, " he told the Sunday Tribune.

St Luke's Dr Garry Courtney described her as "an inspiration" yesterday. "I was very upset to hear that she had died, " he said. "I visited her last Saturday and she was very unwell, but at the same time she was very calm, very focused and concerned about her family. I don't say this often about people, but she really was one in a million.

"Susie knew that she was dying, but she had to speak out and make a difference to try and help other people, " said Janette Byrne of Patients Together. "Even to the last she was still anxious to know that things were improving and that she had made a difference."

Long's family and friends plan to set up a trust in her name to raise funds for a Kilkenny hospice.

She is survived by her husband Conor MacLiam and her children Aine and Fergus. She will be cremated at Mount Jerome tomorrow afternoon after a non-religious service.