My name is Blair Hadley, CEO of our company and inventor of the Ostomy Aid. I invented the first Ostomy Aid for one of my best friends – my mother. During her three-year battle with colon cancer, like so many people fighting this and other life-threatening intestinal diseases and injuries, she eventually needed to bypass a portion of her digestive tract with ostomy surgery. In her case it was an ileostomy. I walked every mile of my mother's cancer treatment with her, and I was there for this surgery as well. I must be candid and say I was astonished at the crude manner in which an already awkward, frightening situation, was suggested for my Mom to empty her ostomy pouch. After the operation, the surgery itself had gone great, but that is where the great ended. The first time her ostomy pouch filled, a nurse handed her a plastic beaker and pointed to the bathroom after explaining briefly how to open and close the drainable pouch. Off my mom wobbled, under the influence of serious pain meds, to the bathroom with the beaker in hand. “Hold the beaker between your legs,” the nurse said through the door. The result was unpleasant for all, but of course deeply embarrassing for one of my life's heroes, and this small disaster came as no surprise – the beaker slipped from between her legs and fell to the floor spilling the contents of her pouch all over her slippers and the bathroom. It was an awful moment for Mom, and I know it could have easily been avoided. When mom came home from the hospital, she was still very much recovering from the surgery and still needed help emptying her ostomy pouch because she could neither assume the awkward positions suggested in YouTube videos, nor could she reliably hold a plastic beaker between her legs. My brothers and I were there to help. I think Mom really hated that she needed that help even though she seldom complained. Going to the bathroom had been a private affair all her life as it is for most of us. I knew this, and I wanted her to have her privacy back. I still find it hard to believe the Ostomy Aid or a similar device didn't exist before I created the first one for my mother shortly after she came home from the hospital. The invention is so simple I didn't need to explain it to her. She took one look at it and understood right away how to use it. She never needed anyone's help draining her pouch again, and she never had another mishap. She regained not just her privacy, which we all cherish even if we don't know it till it's gone, but her confidence to be independent as well. So, out of love and common sense was born the Ostomy Aid, a better way for ostomates to use drainable pouches. I am sorry to say that our Mother passed away in early 2016 succumbing to cancer which spread throughout her body, but I know good things can come from even the hardest of times. Mom, a career medical social worker, wanted us to share what I invented with the world. That is what we are doing, and we consider it part of her legacy of service to others – something she taught us to value as one of life's great purposes. The current version is refined a bit, but other than that it varies little from the one I invented for my mother, and my mission is the same: Create a simple, durable device with no moving parts or complex instructions to make using drainable pouches an effortless, private act. I have priced the product to make it available to anyone who wants to try it, and I stand by my product. If you are not satisfied with your Ostomy Aid, then return it within two weeks for a full refund – no questions asked. If your Ostomy Aid breaks or fails in any way in the first 90 days after receiving it, again, return it for a full, no-questions-asked refund or we will replace it free of cost. It is the great hope of myself and my brothers that the Ostomy Aid will be of assistance to any ostomate looking for a better, simpler way to live in a world which wasn't built to suit your needs. Sincerely,
Blair Hadley
Inventor of the Ostomy Aid
