Enterostomal Therapy

Aberdeen has a qualified Enterostomal Therapist Nurse and also a core team of ET support.

What is Enterostomal Therapy?

ET Nurses give preoperative and postoperative counselling to patients who must have ostomy surgery. The duties include marking the stoma site on the abdomen prior to surgery and assisting the patient with postsurgery rehabilitation. This entails education on daily management of the ostomy, and adjustments to diet, exercise and as well as to social and marital relations. ET nurses are responsible for helping patients to cope with fear and frustration and for the involvement of the family in the rehabilitation program.

ET nurses contribute special nursing skills and understanding in the promotion of better patient care by education health-care personnel, both in the hospital and the community. Also, they are involved in the special care of draining wounds, fistulas and decubitus ulcers. ET nurses are obliged to attend and participate in seminars and workshops, to keep themselves up-to-date on new techniques and information, and to carry out research which will result in optimal care for the ostomate.

Approximately 70,000 patients undergo some form of ostomy surgery each year in the United States and Canada. Most, if not all, are aided by an ET.

(Information from the United Ostomy Association of Canada)