IA (Ileostomy & Internal Pouch Support Group)

Peverill House
1-5 Mill Road
Ballyclare
Co Antrim
Northern Ireland
BT39 9DR

Tel: 0800 018 4724
Web: www.iasupport.org
Best time to telephone: 9am - 5pm, Monday - Friday

IA - The Ileostomy and Internal Pouch Support Group was formed in 1956 as the Ileostomy Association. IA is a mutual aid association whose primary aim is to help people who have had their colon removed to return to a fully active and normal life as soon as possible. To achieve this aim IA works closely with the medical profession, the ostomy equipment manufacturers and many others in the caring field. IA also supports research both into causal illnesses and ways of improving the quality of life with an ileostomy. Further details of IA's aims are the following.

• To help anyone who has had, or is about to have, their colon removed, to return to a fully active and normal life as soon as possible.
• To help with all aspects of their rehabilitation including social activities, and relationships with their families, friends, employers, colleagues and members of the general public.
• To work in close co-operation with the medical authorities as part of a team whose primary aim is the complete rehabilitation of every ileostomy or pouch patient.
• To promote and co-ordinate research - not only into ways of improving the quality of life with an ileostomy or pouch, but also into the illnesses which lead to these operations.
• To improve knowledge about the management of ileostomies or pouches and encourage development of new ostomy equipment, skin-care preparations etc.

Members meetings are arranged throughout the country and a journal is published quarterly.