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Lisa Allison
IBD Passport
What are your top tips for travelling with a stoma?
Lisa Allison lists some of her top tips for travelling with a stoma, including preparing before your holiday in advance, starting with short trips, and researching where you are going.
Transcript
It is a good idea when new to having a stoma to be prepared as much as possible before going away so that your confidence increases and you feel happy to be away and you enjoy your holiday. If it's the first time you've been away since you've had your stoma made in the surgery, then it's a good idea to do a short trip to start off with so that again, you have confidence and then you can prepare for maybe going further [refilled] or a long haul flight. I recommend that you research where you're going if it's somewhere you've not been before, particularly sort of long distance places to see if there might be public toilet facilities and if there might be hand washing facilities in those public toilets so you know where you can go when you're out and about away from your accommodation. And it's also a good idea to prepare with some simple phrases to ask in another language if you're abroad obviously, to ask where the public toilets might be should you need them when you're out and about.