Exceptional Dental Care

Dear Patient,

We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health.

It’s been two weeks since we opened on the 8th June 2020. Thank you for your patience. We
have been hard at work in getting the various protocols in place to ensure the safety of staff
and patients. We have seen patients for assessments but not for treatment unless it was
non-AGP(no drilling). We have finally managed to secure PPE and fit tested (to ensure the
masks are sealing) the nurses and will start providing AGP’s (Aerosol Generating
Procedures-drilling) in this coming week that follows. Our first appointments might be
priority patients that have contacted us over Lockdown. We will start contacting patients to
resume or complete treatment that has been started. Please be patient.

The treatments you are offered may be different to those you received before, depending
on staff and equipment available. It will take some time before services return to what you
previously experienced as normal.

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 surgery. 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 practice follows infection control guidelines made by the governing bodies. We are up-
to-date on new guidance that has been issued. We do this to make sure that our infection
control procedures are current and adhere to recommendations. These keep changing from
time to time, but we are working hard to keep on top of the latest guidance.
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 practice will communicate with you beforehand to ask some screening
  questions. You’ll be asked those same questions again at your appointment
• We have hand sanitiser that we will ask you to use when you enter the
  practice. You will also find some in the reception area and other places in the
  practice for you to use as needed.
• We no longer offer magazines, children’s toys and so forth, since those items
  are difficult to clean and disinfect
• Appointments will be managed to allow for social distancing between patients.
  That might mean that you’re offered fewer options for scheduling your
  appointment.

We will do our best to allow greater time between patients to reduce waiting times for you,
as well as to reduce the number of patients in the reception area at any one time.

How you can help:

• With the exception of children and patients with carers, patients should come
  alone
• A distance of at least 2 metres must be observed if another patient is present in
  the dental practice
• Payment should be made by card where possible
• Staff will not shake your hand
• If you show symptoms following appointment booking, you should contact the
  practice by phone
• Please do not arrive early to the practice. If necessary, you should wait outside
  the practice
• Please do not arrive without an appointment
• Patients should come wearing a mask if possible or be prepared to wear one.

Due to the current guidelines, after carrying out an AGP (Aerosol Generated Procedure ie
drilling), at the end of that treatment, the room has to be left for one hour in order for the
aerosol to settle. This is followed by a thorough cleaning of the treatment room including all
surfaces. We estimate that the treatment room will not be available for between one to one
and a half hours between treatments. This is to ensure that all surfaces that have been
contaminated are thoroughly disinfected. I’m sure that you can appreciate that we will see
far fewer patients than we did previously because of this.

There is also a new patient journey which you can download here that summarises
what to expect.

Finally, rest assured, we are the same dental practice, with the same staff, who all want to
help our patients. However, we will look different due to the PPE we have to wear, and the
journey will be a little different. All these precautions are to safeguard you and our staff.

If you need to call us, please call between 9:00 am and 5:00pm Monday-Friday on
07419832628 or the surgery on 01604 706887

Thank You

Anish