The team at Kirkland Periodontics & Implants is excited to see you! While we have enjoyed this gift of time with our families, much of our purpose is derived from serving you, our patients. We are acutely aware all of you have been affected by the Coronavirus either directly or indirectly and I hope returning to routine dental care will provide some normalcy to your life.
At the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, we created a multi-step approach to create the safest environment possible for us to treat you, our patients. By nature, most medical/dental procedures create risk due to the proximity of providers and their patients to one another during the interaction required for visits. For this reason, these steps remain in place to ensure the safety of you and our team.
The new mask mandate surrounding the latest CDC guidelines for those who have been fully vaccinated has created some confusion as to whether masks need to be worn in dental office settings when vaccinated. To avoid any confusion, our policy in regards to masking of our team and our patients remains unchanged at this time. We applaud those who have elected to take the step to become vaccinated as well as our team towards these steps. That said, in health care environments, CDC guidelines still recommend masking/face coverings in all non-treatment areas, even when vaccinated. Thank you for your cooperation in this regard.
As always, if you are feeling any commonly associated signs of COVID-19 or have a known exposure to it in the last 10 days, please contact our office to reschedule any upcoming visits.
Click on each of the saftey items below to learn more:
Our office has always utilized PPE that exceeds all governmental requirements, however in light of the Covid-19 pandemic we have enhanced these in-office PPE requirements.
Business Team Personnel will use the following forms of PPE in your interactions:
Disposable Gowns
Face Shield
ASTM Level III Mask
Gloves when handling documents that will be passed from person to patient
Clinical Personnel, in addition to what is listed above will also wear:
Hair Bonnet
ASTM Level III mask for non-aerosol creating procedure
N95 or equivalent respirator for aerosol creating procedure
Eye protection and Face Shield
Shoe covers if shoes cannot be appropriately disinfected
Team members have been asked to complete a health screening form upon returning to work in our office. To this date, employees who have been screened on a regular basis have not tested positive for the COVID-19 virus.
Kirkland Perio has always practiced Universal Precautions in the care of our patients. In addition to this we have and will continue to review the following:
In addition to our existing protocols, each team member will be required to complete the following:
Complete regular at-home temperature monitoring
If they are feeling unwel, they have been asked to stay home and report to management
Leave unnecessary fashion accessories at home
Be trained on proper operation of Air Purifications systems
Make sure common areas are free of magazines, coffee stations, or other high-touch, non-essentials
Make sure all patient treatment and waiting areas are appropriately stocked with tissues and hand sanitizer
Trained in the use of infrared thermometers
All patient prior to receiving an appointment in our office will be asked to complete a detailed screening questionnaire and it will:
Inform patients of the risks of having care completed in a dental/medical setting at this time.
Serve to provide consent to be seen at this time.
Help our clinical team to better understand your treatment needs at this time so if possible we can have you "treatment/doctor ready" upon your arrival requiring less in-office time to be made aware of your needs and help reduce the number of overall visits required to complete care.
Help to prioritize your needs as the preservation of PPE is still important and to ensure the temporal spacing of patients to minimize the number of people that come through the office on a daily basis.
Help to screen patients based on risk factors and whether the treatment should be completed NOW or after an appropriate waiting period to mitigate risk to the patient and our team.
Introduce remote/virtual consultatino when appropriate and applicable.
Depending on your answers to the screening questions, they may disqualify you from treatment at this time.
Upon arrival, patients will be greeted by our business personnel.
Temperature to be taken. Under 100 okay, anything over, your appointment will be canceled and we will call you to reschedule.
At this time, we will give you an oral rinse consisting of 1.5% hydrogen peroxide and direct you to a restroom.
You will be asked to rinse with this solution for 20 seconds and also asked to wash your hands at this time.
If you are not wearing a mask of your own, one will be provided to you.
You will be asked to keep this mask for the duration of your appointment.
Hand sanitizer will be positioned throughout the office as will appropriate personal hygiene tissues as needed.
Your companion will be asked to wait outside of the office during the duration of their visit.
Patient scheduling will be modified to reduce the overlap of patients in the office at any one time.
Appointment times will be protracted to allow for appropriate social distancing.
For this reason, it is extremely important you understand you must be on time, and patients must be on time.
Please do not be late, and do not be early.
We will contact you if your arrival time needs to be adjusted for any reason.
Individuals that are not patients will be asked to remain in their vehicles while their companions' treatment is being completed.
In some cases, we may request that you remain in your vehicle until the office is ready to receive you.
Following the completion of treatment:
Utilize a touchless payment solution(pre-collect to avoid this step when possible).
You will be asked to remove PPE in the operatory prior to leaving operatory.
You will be asked to place the mask back over your face once final x-rays, intra-oral steps have been completed.
We will have you notify your companion that you are ready to depart the office, if applicable
We will ensure appropriate post-operative instructions and medications have been provided to you.
