Call for papers- blueheron's "chef's hat" instructions

Ha ha! I was on top of a peak today but now I am back:) I was just spending the evening brushing up on some guitar playing and my fingers need a break. Perfect time to respond!

I really do need to write a blog post about the technique with some photos. It is so simple yet so hard to explain! Basically you wrap a paper towel strip around your stoma with some sticking off the end. It is going to be easier to do with a non-flush stoma as you need some stoma sticking out to wrap the paper towel around.

Here is a more complex description.

1. Take a sheet of paper towel. Either cut or tear it into roughly 1.5 inch strips that are the length of a sheet of paper towel (they will end up being about 1.5" by 7.5" depending on the size of your brand of paper towel sheet)

2. Wrap a strip around your stoma so that it looks like a tube (or chef's hat with my imagination) extending off the tip of your stoma. Mine generally overlaps the top of my stoma about 1/2" and then 1" of the paper tube (top of the chef's hat) extends beyond the stoma to collect output. The moisture of the intestine will soak into the paper towel a bit where it is touching the stoma. This actually holds the tube in place. It also creates a bit of a seal and keeps the output in the top of the tube/hat (described in next step).

3. If you are outputting like crazy, the top of the paper tube will fill up with poop. When it does, pop off the tube, toss it in the waste basket, and quickly wrap on a new one. (Pop it off gently or the stoma may start to bleed a little). The tube will catch output and keep it from dribbling down the side of your stoma where you are working to put on powder, Duoderm, paste... whatever.

With really liquid output, the tube/hat doesn't catch it as well, but it is better than nothing. More absorbent paper towel like Brawny etc. would probably work the best, but I buy the recycled "Earth First" paper towels at Costco because they are more eco-friendly. They work pretty well. Toilet paper does not work. It gets too flimsy from the moisture of a stoma and output.

I usually tear up 5 paper towel sheets worth of strips and sit them next to me so they are ready to grab when I am changing my appliance.

I first picked up this tip on some random forum somewhere (sorry-- I don't remember where) and it completely changed my whole outlook on appliance changes. I used to be brought to tears when my stoma would spew output everywhere, but with the paper towels strips, I can totally take my time with changes. Once in a while I will still have those times when my stoma is just churning out pure liquid output and that is beyond what the paper towel strips can handle... but those instances are very rare.

The nice thing about this method too is that you can try your wafer on over your stoma when it is wearing its "hat". This comes in handy for me because my stoma is a really weird shape and I have to custom cut the hole in my wafer. Even when I follow the pattern I made, I still don't always cut it exactly right. Sometimes I will have to test the wafer over my stoma a few times to make sure it is the correct size and then trim it here and there before I can actually peel off the paper and stick it on. With my stoma's "hat" or tube on, I can try the wafer on numerous times without getting output all over it.

Good luck!

I do this with my loop to try and keep everything dry while doing a change. Seems to work and I do have to change it a couple times before I get the wafer on.

Excellent description Blueheron!