Why Keep Your Night Drainage Bag At The Foot Of Your Bed Instead Of On The Side?

Many of us that have a urostomy choose to use a night drainage bag to ensure our pouches stay empty. We know that keeping our urostomy pouches empty helps prevent leaks and can help prevent urinary tract infections by continually flushing bacteria down into the night drainage bag.

For me, one of the most annoying "you'll get used to it" things to deal with was not being able to sleep in positions I slept in prior to surgery. I'd have my drain bag on the side of my bed near where my thighs are. If I rotated towards the opposite side of the bed, I would either get wrapped up in the tubing, or pull on it significantly. So, we limited my movement by placing towels, a foam wedge, etc to prevent me from turning. Well, that's not living my life, that is adjusting my life for pvc tubing. No way!

There is an excellent Facebook Forum called Urostomy Awareness. It was on this forum where I first learned about moving the drainage bag from a side of the bed, to the foot of the bed. The foot of the bed is down at the bottom near where your feet are.

When you move the drainage bag down to the end of the bed it does a few things.

• It prevents you from tripping over the bag when you get up in the morning.

• More importantly, it allows the tubing to travel down past your thighs, knees, and feet.

This, allows you to rotate back and forth as much as you want with the tubing staying between your legs.

One negative side affect of this is that it does not prevent the tubing from twisting, which then causes the pouch to twist up. This can prevent flow, so it is something to be mindful of. Using Quick Disconnect fittings allows the tubing to rotate at the fitting connections and can help prevent pouch twist.

So, if you want to sleep on your side...either side, consider moving the drainage bag to the end of the bed.

You'll likely need to extend your tubing. This is something you can do yourself. We wrote a simple instruction on how to extend your drainage bag tubing yourself at home. You can grab the supplies at your local hardware store, or on our website.

Hopefully, this information helps you Live Your Life!

- Chameleon Ostomy