Dear Patients,
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:

• » Screening questions and “no touch” temperature checks
  • ⚬ Our office will communicate with you 48 hours and 24 hours before your appointment to ask some screening questions. You’ll be asked those same questions again when you are in the office.
  • ⚬ At the time of your visit you will also receive a “no touch” temperature check.
• » Personal Protective Equipment (PPE)
  • ⚬ A plexi-glass shield has been added around the reception area.
  • ⚬ Dr. Petinge and staff are required to wear PPE at all times.
  • ⚬ Patients are to wear safety glasses at all times and masks with the exception of during treatment.
  • ⚬ Staff temperature checks are taken and a daily screening log is maintained.
  • ⚬ Staff wear antibacterial scrubs, lab coats, face shields, goggles, hair caps, and KN95 masks and two layers of gloves.
  • ⚬ Everything worn by staff is disposable or laundered in a licensed facility.
• » Private treatment rooms
  • ⚬ Our private treatment rooms provide an additional level of separation and protection between patients.
• » Surface cleaning and sanitization
  • ⚬ We have hand sanitizer that we will ask you to use when you enter the office. You will also find some in the reception area and other places in the office for you to use as needed.
  • ⚬ We wipe down all surfaces throughout the day and all equipment between patients.
  • ⚬ You may see that our waiting room will no longer offer magazines, children’s toys and so forth, since those items are difficult to clean and disinfect.
• » Reducing aerosols
  • ⚬ Patients are required to do a 30 second pre-treatment disinfecting mouth rinse, called Eversmile, to clean, disinfect, and debride the entire oral cavity prior to treatment.
  • ⚬ Our Dental Hygienists are limiting spread of aerosols by hand scaling and using a high speed evacuation system.
• » Social Distancing
  • ⚬ To allow time for disinfecting patient areas all our appointments are staggered.
  • ⚬ We are modifying patient scheduling to allow greater time between patients and to reduce waiting times for you, as well as to reduce the number of patients in the reception area at any one time.

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. To make an appointment, please call our office at 781-854-3585 or visit our website at petingedental.com

Thank you for being our patient. We value your trust and loyalty and look forward to welcoming back our patients, neighbors and friends.

Sincerely,
Dr. Stephen G.Petinge and the staff at Petinge Dental