Skip to main content

Stoma jumble sale

Not having a Stoma anymore means that I have lots of medical products at home that I no longer require. (It still sounds very strange to be able to say that I don't have a Stoma- not sure how long it will take to get used to it!)

I wasn't really sure what I was going to do with all but thought I would worry about that in the coming weeks. 

Anyway, I was chatting to the lady in the bed next to me who was saying that her Stoma supply company didn't supply very good wipes (for cleaning the Stoma site when changing the bag). She liked the ones that I had so I told her I had a lot at home. 

I said that I could get my parents to bring all my supplies in and she could rummage through the bag 

And that's exactly what she did. 


My parents thought it was hilarious how excited she got about a new product shed never used and how animatedly we talked about all the item. Mum said it was like a Stoma jumble sale!

And the good news is that the Stoma nurse has taken the items she didn't use or want. She will send them to a charity that dispatch them to third world countries where some people have to resort to using crisp packets as Stoma bags because they can't afford to buy the proper stuff. 

So everyone's a winner- happy days. 

NB x

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Caravan wankers

Over the last few years when I was stuck in hospital for long periods of time Hubby and I would talk about what we would do if I ever got ‘better’. During some of those times when I was so, so poorly the idea of just being at home for more than a few weeks at a time seemed like a far fetched dream. But I’m currently living that dream! And obviously I know I will never ‘get better’ but for these purposes ‘getting better’ meant being well enough to be at home, not in pain 24/7 and not in bed all day, every day. Not too much to ask now is it??  So in our talks, once I was at home and was well enough to do the real basic things like watch Big Fella play football, Big Girl play netball, go to Tesco, play with the dog, go to the cinema etc one thing kept cropping up. We would love to have a motor home and tour round the country. We talked about the places we would like to visit, how much Buddy the dog would love it and how it would give us a chance to reconnect with each other.  But...

Now I’m panicking

This morning I saw my consultant on the ward round. I was excited to find out the plan to get me home later this week but it looks like the plan is a little bit different to what I thought… The gastro consultant had spoken to the microbiology consultant who said I need two weeks of antibiotics from the first date I had them. Depending on which antibiotic we are counting from (as I’m currently on three different types) that takes me up to either the 18th or 19th December. So far this was what I was expecting and so in my head I was thinking that I would probably be home for the weekend, just in time for the annual tradition of Christmas bowling with Bestie and her kids on Saturday 21st December.  But then he told me that we need to leave it 24-48 hours with no antibiotics and then do another blood culture from my Hickman line. After taking the blood culture we then need to wait 2 days (minimum) to make sure no bugs grow on the culture and only when they are satisfied that the line i...

Trying to get vaccinated

When I was an inpatient recently I asked about getting the Covid vaccine because I’m classed as Clinically Extremely Vulnerable (ECV). Apparently other patients on the ward had gotten theirs but I was told that it wouldn’t be possible and that I would have to get in touch with my GP. Apparently staff within the hospital had been using the system to book vaccinations for friends and family by saying that they were an inpatient and as a result they were now only vaccinating staff who could show their ID badge.  I can understand that people are worried about the people that they love but to think that people abused the system in that way makes my blood boil.  So when I was discharged I rang the GP surgery and was told that they had absolutely nothing to do with the vaccination programme and that I would need to get in touch with NHS England. So I called NHS England and spoke to an adviser who told me that according to the system I wasn’t eligible for a vaccination. I explain...