What We Are Doing to Keep You and Our Team Safe
We are excited to have the opportunity to welcome you back! Our office has always utilized personal protective equipment (PPE) that has exceeded all the CDC guidelines; however, in light of the COVID-19 Pandemic, we have instituted additional guidelines and protocols to ensure your safety.
You will see many changes as we have new ways of scheduling your appointments and managing your insurance and financial transactions. First, you will be contacted 48-72 hours prior to your appointment via phone, text, or email and asked a set of health-related questions. It is required that we complete this questionnaire prior to your appointment. We will have to reschedule your appointment if we are unable to complete this step. Below is a list of some of the enhanced precautions we have taken to protect you in addition to extensive team training on infection control and patient management procedures.
- Personalized arrival procedures to guide you from your car directly to treatment rooms to eliminate contacting surfaces.
- Maintain distancing in the reception area for essential caregivers and parents of minors if they cannot wait in a vehicle or outside the clinic.
- Removed magazines and items that can harbor or transfer germs of any kind. Hand sanitizers will be positioned throughout the clinic.
- Providing more educational materials to enhance your awareness of health issues related to this pandemic.
- We require a mask to be worn by ALL patients upon entering the office.
- Installed sneeze guards or droplet barriers at all reception areas.
- Our team and patients should wash and sanitize their hands before all appointments.
- Introduce an oral pre-rinse by all patients to reduce exposure to germs.
- Require all team members to undergo periodic testing for COVID-19 and antibodies for the earliest detection of exposure.
- Record the temperature of every patient upon entering the office.
- Record the temperature and lung efficiency of every team member each day at the beginning and end of the work period.
- Payment arrangements in advance to avoid delay and allow contactless exit from the appointment.
- Enhanced operatory disinfection procedures of all surfaces between patients.
- Ambient air management with HEPA 13 air filtration continuously in treatment rooms and common areas to remove germs from circulating air.
- Enhanced HVAC disinfection with UV light or HEPA Filtration units.
- Enhanced operatory disinfection procedures before and after all appointments with mist or fogging devices to access hard to reach places that can be easily missed.
- New personal protection equipment like visors, gowns, and masks for our doctors and team to provide barriers against the smallest of germs.
- Introduce protocols to reduce or eliminate airborne aerosols during all dental procedures.
- Enhanced nightly disinfection procedures of equipment and office fixtures like computers, keyboards, telephones, tablets, chairs, doorknobs, and buttons that may be touched unconsciously.
- Disinfection of all outside mail and packages that enter the building.
- Longer appointment times for you to prepare and complete all appointment tasks and duties in the safest and the most comprehensive manner.
- Providing teledentistry services to follow up lab reports or communicate online through video education.
- Provide disease testing recommendations for exposure detection to viruses.