AccessAble #stomafriendly Campaign – Living With A Stoma

You may have recently read my post about becoming an AccessAble Champion. I was super pleased to be invited onto the team, and even more pleased as it came right before they launched their #stomafriendly imitative.

The Stoma Friendly imitative is in partnership with Colostomy UK. One in 450 people in the UK live with a stoma and this campaign aims to help those people identify and access suitable toilet facilities. The AccessAble website and app now has a stoma friendly badge, so people can identify where they can find facilities (eg. bathrooms) where they will have all they need to empty/change their bag. Find out more about this here.

I was asked to write on the AccessAble blog about life with a stoma and how this initiative is going to help others with ostomies.

Living With A Stoma

Hi, I am Natalie and I am 34. I have a number of chronic illnesses including Crohn’s Disease. In 2016 I had to have surgery on my bowel and this resulted in my ileostomy, which I named Stanley.  

What Is A Stoma?

There are different types of stoma, but the three main ones related to the digestive and urinary system are colostomy, ileostomy and urostomy.  There are many different reasons that people have to have ostomies formed and these include IBD, cancer, injury and bowel obstruction.

A colostomy is created from part of the large bowel and is usually placed on the left side of the stomach.  An ileostomy is created from part of the small bowel and is normally located on the right side of the stomach.  A urostomy is formed when there is a problem with the bladder and it needs to be removed.  The urostomy enables urine to be removed from the body, whereas colostomy and ileostomy output is faeces.

Roughly 1 in 450 people in the UK live with a stoma and sometimes these are temporary and sometimes may be permanent, depending on why a person needed it in the first place.

Continue reading by clicking here

There is also a short video of me talking about this initiative – why om Earth the still is always the worst I have no idea!!!

I am so pleased to be involved in this launch as I think it is going to be so helpful. I hope you enjoy checking out all the resources I have included in this and don’t forget to download the app! The stoma friendly badge joins a huge list of different filters for those with a whole host of different needs. Take care and keep safe everyone,