Challenge
Helping patients and their families to cope with their ostomy
Having an ostomy bag changes a person's life. Many patients who have one struggle to cope with the change, as it is their responsibility to maintain and change the bag, prevent leaks and overflow, and track output for medical records. This sort of constant maintenance can be overwhelming to people who are already struggling with a new lifestyle. Having a device that helps monitor and record output can help alleviate the burden patients face, and eliminate the dehumanizing aspect of having their schedule revolve around a bag.
Despite the fact that thousands of people now have a life saving ostomy-bag, not many technical advances have emerged to help patients with the life changing, clinical aspects of tracking their waste and maintaining their bags.
Ostom-i is a Bluetooth device that monitors patients' ostomy-bags. Using a small element that could accurately measure pouch fullness, by sensing the arc in the bag’s external curvature, the alert clips onto the pouch and sweeps the bag every few seconds, sending measurements to a free app on a smartphone.