A new approach to stoma management

A new approach to stoma management

Neeraj Kumar , Pranav Chopra
AIIMS, New Delhi, India; IIITDM, Jabalpur, India

A new approach to stoma management Neeraj Kumar, Pranav Chopra nkumar@crimsonhealthcare.in AIIMS New Delhi, IIITDM Jabalpur Need of an innovation: People suffering from Colorectal cancers, IBD and other intestinal pathologies undergo surgery which result in an ostomy. Continence is lost, and stool comes out into a disposable bag stuck on to the abdomen. The Quality of life of ostomates becomes poor due to loss of continence, skin excoriations and social stigma.

Our unique platform device, SphinX provides a safe, secure, and discreet solution to stoma management while restoring continence to the patient. Our device is disposable device that needed to be replaced every 10 days and 28 days for colostomy and ileostomy patients respectively, and does not need supporting accessories such as adhesives, belts etc. It also eliminates bag associated skin excoriations.

SphinX will provide a leak free system which will prevent any stool from contacting the peristomal skin thereby significantly reducing complications like skin excoriation, dermatitis and inflammation. SphinX will improve the patient’s overall quality of life and provide them confidence in performing day-to-day activities while eliminating all skin complications caused by current products.

Two million people are living with an ostomy globally. Most of these patients fall in the 25-60 year age bracket; i.e. the productive working age. The Disability Weights for the Global Burden of Disease 2013 study published in Lancet Global Health 2015 puts the disability weight for stoma at 0.095 which is much more than the disability weight for single arm amputation with treatment (0.039). This illustrates the difficulty in leading a normal life for an ostomate.

Current solutions are cumbersome and restrictive for the patients, limiting their physical activity, exacerbated by the emotional trauma associated with this condition. In addition, state-of-the-art ostomy bags also create many skin complications. SphinX is a safer, more secure, easy-to-use, continent ostomy management system that will allow ostomates to live a normal life once again and overcome a disability (loss of sphincter function). We have started manufacturing our device and completed user testing with more than 12 colostomy patients in association with Ostomy Association of India, Mumbai. We plan to launch our device by the end of next month.

Using our device, we believe more than two million ostomates will be able to live a normal life, exercise, travel, have intimate relations thus significantly improving their lives.