Closing the Gap Between Hospital and Home

Nearly 38% of ostomy patients return to the emergency room or are readmitted within 90 days of surgery — one of the highest readmission rates of any surgical population. A 2026 review of more than 27,000 ostomy patients across nearly 660 U.S. hospitals found the pattern even starker for ileostomy patients specifically: 52.3% readmitted within 120 days, with ostomy-related complications (infection, dehydration, appliance malfunction) driving nearly two-thirds of those returns.

Most of this is a staffing and continuity problem, not a patient problem

The condition itself isn't what's driving readmissions. It's a shortage of wound, ostomy, and continence nurses, and a hard handoff between the hospital team that trained the patient and the home health team that takes over. A structured discharge-education study found that a simple FAQ handout, reviewed with patients before discharge, cut the share of patients calling the clinic in the critical 72-hour-to-21-day window from 49% down to 15% — evidence that most of what drives a call, or eventually a readmission, is predictable and preventable with the right structure in place.

A separate hospital study testing a digital follow-up platform against routine telephone check-ins found the same pattern from a different angle: real-time, photo-based symptom reporting cut six-month complication rates from 50% down to 22.2%, simply by catching skin problems and stoma issues while they were still minor.

The S.O.A.P. protocol

Ostomy S.O.A.P. closes that gap directly. Patients enrolled in the protocol are supported by certified ostomy care nurses, registered dietitians, and physical therapists who bridge hospital and home health care — reviewing stoma photos in real time to catch skin problems before they become an ER visit, guiding new ostomates through the dietary changes their surgery requires, and supporting a structured exercise program to reduce the risk of parastomal hernia — which reaches 33 to 44% within a year, and as high as 50% by seven years, without proper management.

“For the first three to six months after surgery — longer if the physician directs it — patients have continuous access to their care team by phone, text, or email, fully integrated into the ordering physician's EMR.”

Patients get support through the hardest part of adjusting to life with an ostomy. Physicians and health systems avoid the readmissions that currently define this population.