The difference between drainage and stoma

In medicine, there are two forms of surgical methods: drainage and ostomy, but the difference between drainage and ostomy is huge, and they are two completely different surgical methods. Let’s first look at drainage, which is a surgical procedure that removes pus and blood from the human body or tissues through a guide. Stoma means opening, and it is a type of surgery used in internal medicine, mostly for intestinal reconstruction and other methods.

The main purpose of stoma is to output intestinal contents, relieve intestinal obstruction, protect the anastomosis or damage of the distal intestinal opening, promote the recovery of intestinal diseases, and decompress the intestine. There are also colostomy, urethrostomy, etc.

The word stoma comes from the Greek word meaning mouth or opening. The earliest ostomy was performed in the early eighteenth century because of war. Due to the war and limited conditions at that time, the patients with intestinal injuries on the battlefield could only have their intestines separated, and one or both ends of the intestines were led to the body surface to form an opening, or a loop. This not only solved the patient's excretion problem, but more importantly, it could save the patient's life. Most of the methods of connecting the intestines failed and resulted in death due to infection. Later, doctors used this technology in surgical operations. When the diseased intestine was removed and the intestine could not be reconnected, a section of the intestine was pulled out and reversed at the appropriate position in the abdomen, and then sutured to the abdominal wall. Finally, an intestinal mucosa with an opening and a nipple was formed. This is medically called an intestinal stoma, commonly known as an "artificial anus." The stoma can be used to separate the intestine at one location or at several different locations, because different parts of the intestine perform different functions. For example, a stoma in the ileum is different from a stoma in the colon.

Drainage is a surgical treatment method that is a technique for diverting pus, blood or other fluids accumulated between human tissues or in body cavities to the outside of the body or into the visceral cavity. Surgical drainage not only includes external drainage, which is the drainage of fluid accumulated in tissues or body cavities to the outside of the body, such as abscess incision, enterostomy, abdominal drainage, chest drainage, etc., but also includes internal drainage, that is, diverting or shunting the fluid through other hollow organs to achieve the purpose of drainage, such as internal drainage of bile duct, pancreatic cysts, etc.