Advocacy in Action: UOAA 2025 Recap!

The 25th Anniversary logo for the UOAA conference, which says “A Whole New World.”

It’s been 20 years of ostomy awareness – oh, my! And by 20 years of ostomy awareness – we mean 20 years of the United Ostomy Association of America (formerly known as the UOA). In the beginning of August – President, Alicia, Director of Events, Elizabeth and Treasurer, Krista – flew out to Florida to attend and exhibit at the 2025 UOAA conference! We were amazed to see how many returning ostomates there were, but even more surprised to see how many NEW faces came through – including our very own ShayLee and Megan – two of our incredible social media volunteers – who we finally got to meet in person!

Alicia, Krista and Elizabeth at the Girls With Guts booth in the exhibit hall!

The exhibit hall was jam packed from ostomy supply manufacturers to new ostomate concepts – including the Stoma Doula! If you want support PRE-ostomy – she’s your girl! We also learned about SO many other new tools and products on the market – one being Revel – an ostomy lubricant and deodorizer with such a small footprint – it’s great for travel (not to mention the branding was adorable), Ostoh – which was this unique device to help burp your bag with the click of a button, and we met The Girl With The Bag who makes these incredible custom ostomy bag covers!

Elizabeth, Krista and Alicia in front of the “Mad Hatter” back drop at the closing theme party.

When we weren’t exhibiting – we were attending a variety of incredible sessions including: Body Image, Wardrobe Tips and Possible Complications with Kimberly Holiday-Coleman and Nate Hadlock that had us all emotional, a session on Medical Female Issues: Pelvic Floor Dysfunction with Registered Nurse Molly McPeek where we were floored by some of the statistics she presented on pelvic floor health within the regular population in contrast to those who have had ostomy surgery amongst other things and that had a fun spin on advocacy called UOAA’s Got Advocacy Talent with UOAA Advocacy Manager, Jeanine Gleba! The weekend wrapped with a Mad Hatter theme party (our favorite) where everyone danced the night way!

Alicia and Elizabeth in the resort pool with a dozen+ other ostomates!

Outside of the sessions and when we weren’t in the exhibit hall – we were out and about exploring the incredible resort area, or by the pool – which was incredible. If you have never been to the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Resort – 10/10 recommend. It was such an inspiring sight to see SO many ostomates in the pool at once – talk about advocacy in action!

The energy at the conference was so inspiring – especially to see how far the ostomy community has come in the last 20 years – it really was a whole new world!

See you at the next one in Vegas in 2027!

• About The Author

Born and raised in Philadelphia, PA, Alicia puts a little bit of “brotherly love” into everything she does. She is a graduate of the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University where she studied Television, Radio, & Film. She now works as a freelance editor, producer, videographer, and photographer. Alicia was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis at the age of 14 and when she was re-diagnosed with Crohn’s disease at 22, Girls With Guts was just starting out. Her passion for GWG was instantaneous as she had not had that kind of support before. She has been on the board of Girls With Guts since 2013 starting out as Director of Multimedia and has now served as President since 2017. She’s always had a knack for bringing ideas to life and that is where her passion and Girls With Guts merged. If she’s not helping to further the overall vision of Girls With Guts, you can catch her raising awareness about her personal IBD journey whenever she can.