After bowel surgery if you have colon cancer, you may need to use a pouch. The boxes of different supplies and the instructions for care that accompany this may be exciting but changing your pouch may scare you. If you’re good at this though, it does take less than 15 mins.
How Often To change
It ultimately depends on the following:
The ostomy location
The frequency and consistency of the bowels
The skin oiliness
How much activity you do
Temperatures both outside and inside
What type of appliance you like to use—whether one or two piece
The location does determine the bowel consistency, since in a lot of cases the ones with looser stool do need to be changed more, but if it’s semi-formed, it doesn’t need to be changed as often.
If you have moist or oily skin, or the temperature is hot, the colostomy pouch may not stick, which requires more and more changes.
If you’re active and also like to exercise, you might need to change this more.
Because some have to be changed more often, you should follow the guidelines and the instructions that your doctor or ET nurse have to show you how to change this.
If you do notice leakage, it s time to change that.
Don’t let it get more than a half to a third full, since this can impact the adherence of this.
Supply gathering
Before you change, you need the following.
Towels, water, and soap
The appliance and a clip if needed
Scissors for a two-piece type of appliance to make sure the barrier wafer is trimmed.
Skin adhesive
Stoma powder or paste
Disposable bag
Put all of the supplies in your bathroom and use a stool to empty the bag into the toilet before you go to change it. Some people also prefer sitting down.
The Process
First, you need to remove that appliance that you had before. Open up the clip, drain the contents towards the toilet before removal, and then put the clip to the side.
Don’t rip off the wafer since that causes stress in the stoma and skin, which causes irritation and bleeding. Press down on your skin barrier with one of your hands and pull the skin away with the other. If you have hair there, trim the hair with scissors or using a razor, since this helps with discomfort.
Get rid of the appliance in a shopping bag, and then tie the top of this in a knot to get rid of odor.
Next you want to wash your skin and stoma. Do this gently, with a washcloth and no soap that’s scented. Air dry the area before you begin, and make sure that it’s a reddish color, or pink.
Next, it’s then time to put the wafer skin barrier on. With a two-piece appliance, you must cut the opening near the center part.
Cut this to match the skin before applying. Make sure the opening matches the stoma, not too big, not too small.
Then, you hold it down there and seal it with the powder. With two piece systems, it does require you to put the pouch in place with a snap, and make sure the clip seals the bag for an open drainage pouch.
And that’s it! It’s not that hard to do, but it does take a little bit of experience. Hopefully though, as you go along, you can get better and better at this, and take less time with this as well.
