Spent the day at LEADCON 2026 Coloplast Academy’s conference on stoma care, ileostomy, and colostomy management and came away with a lot to reflect on.

A few key threads from the sessions:

• The debates were genuinely valuable ileostomy vs colostomy after LAR, whether stoma creation should be selective or routine after neoadjuvant chemotherapy, and stoma vs stenting in obstructive colorectal cancer. These aren’t settled questions, and hearing different surgeons argue their approach sharpened my own thinking.
• Newer techniques are expanding what’s possible without a stoma sphincter-preserving approaches in low rectal cancer, and advances in laparoscopic and complex colorectal surgery, continue to shift what we can offer patients who previously had no alternative.
• A patient survey presented at the conference stayed with me it captured, in patients’ own words, the everyday challenges of living with a stoma: practical, social, and emotional. It was a useful reminder that outcomes on paper don’t always capture the full patient experience.
• Perhaps the most important message of the day: a stoma is not the end of someone’s social life. Despite real stigma, patients living with a stoma continue to work, travel, and live full lives and as surgeons, part of our role is helping patients see that too.
  
  On a personal note, it was wonderful reconnecting with colleagues I trained alongside in Delhi and Gurgaon some conversations pick up exactly where they left off, regardless of the years or the distance in between.Grateful for conferences like this that push clinical thinking forward while keeping the patient experience central.