Study on the time taken for patients to achieve the ability to self-care their new stoma.

BACKGROUND: Stoma formation in colorectal surgery is a recognized independent cause of prolonged hospital stay. It has been shown that preoperative stoma education and siting leads to a reduction in the length of hospital stay. Despite this, the length of time to independent stoma management and the variables that affect this has not been well studied. We conducted a prospective case series to analyse this.

METHODS: A total of 107 consecutive colorectal surgery patients undergoing stoma formation at two separate large metropolitan hospitals, one private funded and the other government funded, were enrolled in a prospective case series. The primary outcome evaluated was independent management of stoma at discharge from hospital. Logistic regression analysis was performed to determine the factors associated with achieving independent stoma management at discharge.

RESULTS: The median length of stay was 9 days (range: 4-71). In our study, 71% of patients achieved self-care at the time of discharge from hospital (76/107 patients). The median length of time taken to achieve independent management of a stoma was 7 days (interquartile range: 6-9). Factors associated with increased chance of independent management of stoma at discharge included younger age, male, preoperative siting and treatment in a public hospital.

CONCLUSION: Our study supports that preoperative stoma education in combination with post-operative stoma education is superior to post-operative stoma education alone. Interestingly, treatment in a private hospital is associated with a higher likelihood of failure to achieve independent stoma management at discharge. This is unexpected and not explained by our data.