COLOSTOMY BOWEL CONTROL

COLOSTOMY BOWEL CONTROL


Patients with a right-sided or upper colostomy do not have as much remaining colon as those with a left-sided or lower colostomy. Because of this, there is usually too little colon left in a lower colostomy to absorb enough water to make a solid stool. A lower colostomy cannot be controlled by irrigation, but instead behaves very much like an ileostomy, with fairly continuous discharge.

The left-sided colostomy is often described as a ‘dry’ colostomy since it usually discharges formed stool. One has the choice of attempting to manage this type of colostomy by either trained control or irrigation control. Only 1/3 of the people who at-tempt to train themselves to control the lower colostomy without irrigation are successful in doing so. This control is more easily and satisfactorily achieved by irrigation. However, there are some patients who can’t achieve irrigation control because they have an ‘irritable bowel’. This problem has nothing to do with the colostomy. It is just part of some people’s makeup. Some people, even before they have their colostomy, may have had very irregular bowel habits. They retain these habits after the colostomy is performed.

Regular irrigation does not assure regularity with irritable bowel syndrome. When this condition exists, the physician will some-times suggest that the patient dispense with irrigation, since it does not produce the desired regular pattern. People may become frustrated by trying to achieve this. People with an irritable bowel situation should treat the colostomy much like an ileostomy by wearing an ostomy appliance all of the time.





Source: Saskatoon Ostomy Association Bulletin, August 2012

Thanks to InsideOut
11.20.2012
/jasmine