We miss you!
It’s been a long 2 months, and we're so happy that we are getting closer to resuming in-person treatments. We are still in the process of securing PPE and establishing new protocols to ensure safety for both you and our dedicated team. We will inform you as soon as we have an opening date. At this point we are aiming for mid- June.
Things will look a little different around the office at your next visit. I will summarize this below in more detail. We will need to adjust our schedules to allow more time between appointments for room prep and to allow for physical distancing. As a result we will be seeing fewer patients in a day. If you already have an appointment booked, you may get a call with a request to shift or reschedule your appointment, as pre-booked appointments may no longer fit into appropriate time slots. We really appreciate your understanding as we all get used to our new "normal." We will do our best to accommodate specific requests.
We have a long list of patients that we will be making our way through upon our initial return. We will be prioritizing based on urgency of care. At this point our College is still asking us to consider the risk/benefit of treatment. They are also asking us to defer treatment, whenever possible, of patients considered high risk for severe COVID-19. We know some of you have been putting up with less than ideal situations and we appreciate your ongoing patience.
We will send out more specifics for you in the next newsletter to further prepare you for your next office visit. If you have any family members who wish to receive their own copy of the newsletters and are not yet on our email list, please encourage them to email us to update their profiles. We are here for you and we are looking forward to seeing you again soon. If you have any questions please email us and Sue, Carla or myself will get back to you. We are not answering the phones at this point, but will be checking our phone messages regularly should you prefer to call.
If you are still not at ease with the prospect of in-person appointments, that's ok! We can still help you with a tele-consult appointment which we will be implementing once we re-open.
We all understand that it is still very important to do our part to continue to flatten the curve to protect our families and our community against transmission of COVID-19. To keep you and our team safe, here are a few details of what we are doing and in what we will require of you:
Clinic:
There will be fewer scheduled appointments to reduce the number of patients in the clinic.
There will be additional cleaning of all common areas and treatment rooms. As you know, in dentistry we already have high infection control standards in place.
No staff member will be allowed to enter or stay in the clinic with ANY signs of illness, and staff will also do the self-screen daily prior to arriving.
Reception staff will be behind plexiglass while they interact with patients.
There will be fewer chairs in the reception area to allow physical distancing.
All practitioners will wear a mask and face shield while treating patients. Depending on the procedure being done, more extensive PPE will be required.
Patient requirements:
Patients will be screened for illness and recent travel prior to attending in-person appointments.
Please cancel and reschedule your appointment if you do not feel well - there will be no cancellation fees charged.
We are deciding if check-in will occur online or via the phone. We may have you wait in your car, inside the lobby, or outside for your appointment until we ask you to come in. We ask that you attend your appointment alone if possible, to reduce the number of people in the reception area unless you are accompanying a minor or infirm patient.
Please come to the clinic at your appointment time; avoid coming early.
All patients will be asked to clean their hands with hand sanitizer upon entrance to the clinic. You may be provided with a mask. We will reconfirm your health assessment questionnaire, take your temperature and have you sign a consent form.
We will also have you use hand sanitizer at the end of your appointment before leaving the clinic.
We will be accepting credit and debit cards as form of payment as well as continue to accept insurance. If you cannot pay by one of these methods please inform us in advance so we can discuss an alternate arrangement.
We hope this provides you a glimpse of what lies ahead for your next office visit. As always, if you have a dental emergency please call our office for further instruction. Once again, we look forward to warmly welcoming you back soon. Stay well.
All the best,
Christine and the team
