Staying Safe at the Dentist – The Office Environment

With COVID-19, patients, dentists and all office staff members have become more concerned than ever about health and safety. While our team has put safety first from the day we opened our practice, we believe that many of the new safety procedures driven by the pandemic are positive developments for the long-term. Because the issue of safety is so important in light of COVID, we are running a six-part blog series about how dentists keep patients safe at the office.

Maintaining a Safe Dental Office Environment

In the last post, we talked about office procedures that help prevent the spread of infectious diseases. But the physical office itself also needs careful attention and a variety of enhancements to reach this goal. Among the steps we’ve been taking are the following:

• Placing directional and positional decals on floors to help keep patients and staff a safe distance apart while moving around the office.
• Arranging waiting room chairs to keep people at least six feet apart.
• Removing magazines, TV remotes, toys and other touchable objects from the waiting room and other office areas.
• Frequent, regular cleaning and sanitation of the waiting room, rest rooms, door handles and other office areas.
• Placing hand sanitizer stations/bottles in areas easily accessible to staff and visitors.
• Carefully disposing of all PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) used by staff and patients, including masks, face shields, gowns and gloves.
• Installing new systems for air quality control and ventilation. — This area is so important we will be describing it in detail in an upcoming post.

These workplace controls have been implemented to help keep you, the patient, as safe and healthy as possible — and also to keep our staff healthy and able to serve you. Everyone at McLean DDS appreciates the understanding, patience and support you have given us as we have been navigating this uncharted pandemic territory.

If you have questions or concerns about health and safety at McLean DDS, please contact us. We are eager to provide whatever information you need.