So, my husband has an end ileostomy done on 10/11 of this year.

The past few weeks he had mucus draining from his rectum and we had our follow up with the surgeon. He suggested taking two 10 minute shallow baths a day with epsom salt in the water to help heal the rectum wound and see him again in 1 month.

Today my husband was walking around in boxers and I noticed blood in the back of his boxers! It wasn't fresh and didn't seem to be occuring anymore but only started happening after the epsom salt baths (which hes been doing for about 3 days now.)

What is this from? Is this typical? I'm calling his doctor's office tomorrow. This is the first day we've noticed blood from the rectum (and it wasn't just a few drops.)

He's really been struggling with sitting comfortably on his bottom after surgery, any suggestions for this?

Also, his stoma is not perfectly round. I found the precut bags are nice but dont completely seal around the stoma. We were sent some barrier seals but we haven't tried them yet. His skin has been VERY sensitive and raw where the adhesive binds, not sure if there is cream for the outter skin where the big square adhesive binds to?

Hi Devi,
if the blood is old it's probably okay - you do get a bit of bloody mucous out the back passage but I would worry if it was bright red, fresh blood.

As for the stoma you need to ensure a good seal no matter what the shape otherwise the skin will breakdown. Don't use creams as the bag is not likely to stick properly. You can usually mold the seals to fit or I cut mine in two and seal each half separately so there's no gaps. I also use the paste - it burns on broken skin but tends to fill any irregular shapes well.

Best of luck!

use 3m skin barrier spray and convatec stomahesive. powder get rid of excess then spray and dry. You can do that up to 3 times around stoma. do one time to outter area. Then put on that adhesive paste- it will stop the burn from the alcohol. also he could have fissures, or cuffitis. if it hurt to sit it could be both. this could also be caused by diversion pouchitis. a convex system and and a ostomy belt will help alot.