Skin condition (warning, photo)

So, I'm wondering if this looks bad compared to what others may have gone through.  My skin goes through periods of red and irritated and then perfectly fine.  Tonight, its mad.  Inflamed and sore. Any thoughts?  Sorry  about the pic but  it was the only way I knew to get my point across.  

Looks like you really do have a problem. What kind of products do you use when you change everything. Do you use lik e a stoma powder or skin prep wipes. Have you talked to a Dr or stoma nurse.

I use the Mio sensura  2 piece bags and i have been trying different barrier rings to see if that is an issue.  I have bravo ones, hollister ones and eakin ones...  I dont use too many products...i do have skin protectant wipes that i used tonight....i have stoma powder but dont really know how im supposed to use it....and i have some marathon that ive used before when its been worse than this....

I have had to change my bag a couple times in the last few days due to leaks...once sunday, once monday and again tonight.  So that has contributed to the irritated skin....i usually only change every other day or every third day...

So, that's where i am at...only been at this since February so im still learning what works and what doesn't....

I have an appointment with my ostomy nurse but not for 2 weeks...it will be cleared up by the time i get i  to see her.  Same thing happened last time....i made an appt when it got irritated but by the time i got to see her, it was cleared up.  

Thanks...Lori

judgelori... wow ... seek emergency care . Don't take the chance by waiting.... 

Angelicamarie

If you can't see a Dr or Nurse soon take the picture with you. I have also been told you can call holister and speak to their Ostomy nurse. They can recommend suggestion to help and can send some samples. You can sprinkle the stoma powder on and just tap the skin to shake some off and dab the skin barrier over that. There is also a lot of vidios (sp) on utubeyou can watch. Here is a link to one but there are more you can look up on youtube.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X6zrh9ErLAQ But I sugest you see your Dr or Nurse. Hope this helps.

Lori,

  That looks perfectly normal to me, considering the recent leakage you describe. My skin gets much redder if exposed to a leak. If what you're showing is as bad as it gets I'd be happy as hell. Many folks on here have way worse skin that gets blood red and weeps constantly.......your ostomy nurse will tell you to use stoma powder before you use the skin protectant wipe and to change your barrier more frequently for a short time to let your skin get back to normal. I'm surprised more people don't post pics on here. If you guys think Lori's skin is bad I can post pics that will make say OMG! 

Regards,

Bob

Hi Lori.  It definitely looks like you've got some irritation there.  I am always having some skin issue myself and have scheduled an appointment with the nurse and arrive with a murphys law stoma skin.  I recently had to change to a bigger cut to fit bag.  As a result I now have some 'baby' skin thats going to be exposed to adhesive whereby it has not been before.  As I suspected I get the irritation from removing the bag off that fresh skin.  Since its not an infection, I smear a thin layer of nystatin on it and let it sit and sink in.  Then I will wash it off with a washcloth, dry and put on a new bag.

Thanks guys!!! I was hoping that on the grand scale,  this wasn't too bad.  It's been a little worse than this before but mostly around the stoma.  This is the first time I've had the large red ring around where the wafer is.  Just hoping I'm not developing an allergy to the wafer.  I've really liked these.  I was so itchy with the Hollister  ones that I changed to these Mio ones and love them.    Ill keep pampering the skin.  Thanks for the advice.  Ill keep yall posted on how it goes!!

Lori

Can you tell me more about what Nystatin is?  Is it prescription?  Over the counter?  Order through Byram?  Not sure what that is. 

Thanks,

Lori

Hi Lori do you use flanges with convexity to force the stoma out more, i know coloplast has varying degrees of convex wafers, and i believe convatec also has them maybe call and get samples to try.

Yes...these are the flanges I use.  

Hi Lori.  Nystatin cream (or powder) is an rx prescribed by your physician.  I was refering to the cream.  I see your using coloplast now.  I love coloplast for the flexibility and have used a number of their one piece bags.  gl

yes i too agreee with Bob..  i do believe that redness is from the leak.. and its nothing to worry about but... for piece of mind since this is new for you, go see a doctor.  the leak will cause the irration.  u cleaned up well.. other than  what i can see as skin folds, i really wouldnt too much about this.. also, are uusing a spray adhesive remover?  that is a must. and also some times irratations can occur using them..  my stoma is about 1 inch and 3/8. round..  and the area around it i keep clean using warm water over the sink or laundry tub. gotta have  flexible faucet..  i use normal soap.. shave around the area..  cause hair will cause leaks too and  fan it dry with cardboard.  spray a barrier on... fan it again.. allow to dry.. then apply waffer.. and the  "c" strips to secure the appliance.  the strips are the deal.  u should not leak using them.  are u familair with them?  accordian style wafers help prevent leaks too and the new  mio type that looks like astart fish looks very promising to stop leaks.  u will find the easy way to do things and learn alot about thing here,  i just joined this august, 2019. but have had the stoma since 12/16.  flew solo a long time before i landed here..  lucky me too.  keep us posted.  good luck

Hi NYt.  I think it would be advantageous to discuss your skin prep with a WOCN or a skin care specialist.  I'm not sure it's a good idea to apply antibiotics or antifungals to healthy skin.  A liquid barrier wipe might give your baby skin the protection it needs without killing some good stuff in your skin.  Just removing the nystatin with a washcloth can cause some skin damage.

 These are just my thoughts and I'm not trained in medicine.  Please let us know how you make out.

Respectfully,

Mike

Hey Your Honor, thanks for the photo.  It's worth at least a thousand words.

Bob's reply is so "dead on".  People like us can get our skin in terrible condition if we don't know what's going on.  Any unprotected skin will get damaged by leakage.  Fixing damaged skin can be very difficult in addition to the discomfort or flat out pain.  We need to do all we can to protect our skin.  Just removing our wafer could be damaging if we PULL the wafer and stretch the skin.  I try to PUSH my skin back into my body to separate it from the wafer to prevent that stretching.  Frequent changes mean frequently subjecting our skin to possible trauma.  I know it can be a mess but we just read, listen and learn.  In time we become experts; with oursevelves, at least.

Hope it all works out well for you quickly,

Mike

I agree with Bob.  My skin has looked much worse from time to time and I have had quite a bit of bleeding during that same period.. I keep it from happening now by keeping it clean and if it does come in contact with fecal matter I make sure to wash it well it well. I always clean it with water on a cotton pad after cleaning with adhesive remover to make sure it is really clean. I Don't use soap but have been known to put a mild medicinal ointment like neosporin on the area because it kills bacteria.  I really find that keeping it clean is keyt.

Hi Lori,

  Looks like your getting lots of good info from folks. Tony's right in that it's all about the learning curve.  As the years progress you'll see a lot of stuff and better understand what works for you and what doesn't. If you ask 5 people how they prep their skin and apply their barrier you'll get 5 different answers.  That's why you want to get friendly with any local ostomy nurses near you. I find those folks will go out of their way to help you, and if you understand your skin the two of you can pretty much figure out a way to deal with any ostomy problem. The fact that they see so many ostomy issues really helps to zero in on your issue and get it solved.

I'm about 2 hours from both Hopkins in Baltimore and Georgetown in DC, without much ostomy nurse help in between. So I always meet with the ostomy nurses from both places whenever I'm at their hospitals for follow-ups with my Gastros, whether I'm having skin issues or not.  I take pics of my skin/stoma at every barrier change, because I can't remove my barrier during the day when in a doctor's office (due to my pretty much constant output) and email them to the nurses a few days before any office visits.  Taking a few pics each time has really helped solve some skin issues that had everybody else completely stumped.......including the whole Dermatology team at Georgetown.  I was able to stitch together pics of my skin right after removing my barrier for a number of prior months to make a poor man's time-lapse and figure out what the heck was going on. Not saying you should do the same, just letting you know there are things you can do to help narrow down options when dealing with stoma skin issues. 

I've used the Nystatin cream (I didn't know it came as a powder......thanks for that Torquey) but found it too greasy to get off easily.  But it may work just fine for you, as your skin isn't too far gone that any rubbing to remove it won't cause your skin to bleed.  A quick note on leakage......it's the cause of the majority of skin problems around your stoma. That was told to me early on and I've found it to be true. And "weepage/seepage" around the stoma seal is very common. In my case it was causing the skin at the base of my stoma to get bright red, but it didn't look like anything was leaking when I looked at the barrier after each removal. So over time it just looked like the red skin was slowly expanding away from my stoma. This had everyone stumped because there's no real reason for the red skin at the stoma base to ever grow or spread out. And looking at a few pics didn't tell the story because of how slowly the red ring of skin was growing/expanding. After trying lots of creams and meds, which did nothing, I thought of making that time-lapse of stoma pics over the last 6 months or so. And when I did it became obvious what was going on and simply sealing my barrier better around my stoma caused the redness to stop growing and start to recede.  So sometimes you just need to think out of the box.

Ok, I'm pretty sure I just won the award for the longest post of all time.....so I better go get my solid 2 hours of sleep before I have to get up and go to work. Let us know how you make out with your skin.

Regards,

Bob

Hi bob I was just wondering if you are still using the Okeefe salve for your skin problems, and is it still helping.

May sound stupid, but I found relief for irritation using okeefs working mans hand cream. Was cleared with my Dr. Just said not to put it directly on stoma. Is greaselees, and with a rinse off, doesn't interfer with adhision. For 6 or 8 bucks is worth a try. Doug

Hi Lovely,

  Actually, yes, I am still using the O'Keeffe's (not sure about that spelling and too lazy to go find the tube) and I'm VERY satisfied with it.  I use it more to moisturize my skin under the bandage part of the barrier/wafer than for adhesion, but I don't even rinse it off.  I just rub it in real good until it disappears, then hit it with my hair dryer on low heat and low flow for 10 seconds or so and I'm good to go.  I'm tempted to use it on my feet, which are in pretty rough shape.  It really does work as people claim.  Yesterday I got my box of Skin-Tac wipes from Amazon, so I'll be trying those next.  So stay tuned, but O'Keeffe's gets a big thumbs up from me!! Oh for myear54....just FYI......Walmart sells it for a little more than half what you stated.  I think my tube was $4 or $4 and change, and there's a smaller cheaper tub as well.

regards,

bob

Thanks Bob, I think I will get a small tube tomorrow to try out. I don't have a big skin problem, just some redness out from the stoma. Ny problem is where the skin and the stoma meet. It stays red and weepy I have an antibiotic cream my regular Dr gave me that I put right around the stoma. Then put stoma powder over that with a skin prep over that. It still looks red and weepy. Maybe that is just me it may be the way it should be. Like I said earlier I was not given any help.So any way thanks for responding.

I have heard the advice that less is more so I have tried the minimalist route, but my skin was not happy about it and would get red like yours. This is my list of products that keep my skin irritation free. Brava adhesive remover wipes, Viva paper towels with just water for washing around the stoma, Coloplast Sween Cream, Brava skin barrier wipes, Hollister Adapt CeraRings(I don’t put the cream or the barrier wipe right around the stoma  where the Hollister ring will be.), Sensura Mio click barrier. I think it can be helpful to hear what works for other people. I hope you can find what works best for you soon!

I think it looks a lot better yall...there is hope in sight!!!  Lol...has a couple days where I leaked and had to change my pouch daily.  But I managed to keep the last one on for 3 days so it appears to have helped.  Just gotta get that area directly around my stoma happy.  I am a work in progress in progress it seems... in more ways than one.. lol...thanks for all of the advice. 

Hi  judgelor, it does look a lot better, hope you will be able to comtinue to keep it under control.

WTG Lori.  Looks like you're on the mend.

Thanks.  I realized that i had nystatin powder that the doc had given me a while back so i started using it...crusting with a skin prep wipe.  That and not having to change my pouch for a couple days helped a lot.  I was pleased this morning when i changed it.  I treated the area right around my stoma with some marathon.  Hoping that helps by the next change.  Thanks for your advice and encouragement.    What a process this is....lol...  Lori

Thanks for your help and encouragement....hoping i can keep my skin healthy from now on....

As an old timer ostomy .. this is what I now use to clear up any irritation due to moisture/ leakage clean the stoma area with Head and shoulders shampoo the Classic one and then  apply Butt Paste ( diaper rash cream) remove any extra then apply karaya 5 Hollister powder. I had a terrible wet rash and found this information on another ostomy site.. even when my skin is clear I add the Butt Paste once a week and clean the area with Head and Shoulders Classic every other day. My skin has been pretty healthy.

Wow, 

That looks  painful. As much as I like the Coloplast two piece, I find the Convetec flange must nicer for my skin! It has a fabric like outter band that is adhesive as well as the inner portion that is normal and my skin has never had any issues. 
Puppyluv

I have a urostomy since 2017. I had issues with skin itching and red, some white tissue ( from leaking). 
It took me 3 try's to find an ostomy nurse that helped me. 
I am using marlen product now.

Agua Tack Hydrocolloid ultra max
Shallow convex one piece
#72522. 7/8” precut or 
#72500 cut to fit

I use viva paper towels moisten with warm water, push on skin at edge of wafer to remove wafer from skin. 
Wash skin with water and vinger(4:1)solution, pat skin no rubbing.  
pat skin dry With cloth

around stoma

sprinkle stomahesive powder , brush off xtra with tissue

apply by patting Cavilon no sting barrier film over powdered skin

use hair dryer or small fan to dry

apply new wafer, use hand to help it adhere (for 1-2 minutes), to make sure it attaches well.

i change wafer every 3-4 days

Agua Tack Hydrocolloid( I sweat easily and this seems kinder to my skin) rarely do I leak.

the convex shape helps to prevent urine getting on skin

hope this gives you some idea's, it sounds complicated but only takes me 3-5min