We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health. Our community has been through a lot over the last few months and all of us are looking forward to resuming our normal habits and routines. While many things have changed, one thing has remained the same: our commitment to your safety.
Infection control has always been a top priority for our practice and you may have seen this during your visits to our office. Our infection control processes are made so that when you receive care, it’s both safe and comfortable. We want to tell you about the infection control procedures we follow in our practice to keep patients and staff safe.
Our office follows infection control recommendations made by the American Dental Association (ADA), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). We follow the activities of these agencies so that we are up-to-date on any new rulings or guidance that may be issued. We do this to make sure that our infection control procedures are current and adhere to each agencies’ recommendations.
You may see some changes when it is time for your next appointment. We made these changes to help protect our patients and staff. For example:
- Our office will communicate with you beforehand to ask some screening questions. You’ll be asked those same questions again when you are in the office.
- We have hand sanitizer that we will ask you to use when you enter the office.
- You may see that our reception room and operatories will have fewer chairs to allow for social distancing, and photos, decor, magazines, etc… have been removed to decrease the number of items to clean and disinfect.
- Appointments will be staggered and lengthened to allow for social distancing and to reduce contact with others.
- Our white clinical jackets will be replaced with the PPE (Personal Protection Equipment) currently recommended.
For those patients who missed hygiene and treatment visits due to the shut-down, we will be calling to reschedule. Please be patient with us! We have had to make many changes in appointment length and procedures and it will take a little finessing to get running back to ‘the new’ normal.
We look forward to seeing you again and are happy to answer any questions you may have about the steps we take to keep you, and every patient, safe in our practice.
As always, we thank you for your trust and loyalty and look forward to welcoming back our patients, neighbors and friends.
Dr. Gerics, Angie, Kelly, Susan, Sonya and Karen