COVID-19 Update

Dear Patients,

We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health. Our community has been experiencing a pandemic over the last few months, and all of us are looking forward to resuming our healthy habits and routines. While many things have changed, one thing remains the same: our commitment to your health and safety.

Infection control has always been a top priority for our practice and you may have seen this during your visit to our office. Our infection control protocol processes are made so that when you receive care, its both safe and comfortable. We want to tell you about the important infection control procedures we will be following 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. Center for Disease Control (CDC), and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). We have been following the recent recommendations of these agencies so that we are up-to-date on any new rulings and guidance issued. Not only we are following all recommendations coming out of the federal agencies, we have gone above and beyond by installing air filtration devices in each room. We will take your temperature at the start of each appointment and ask that accompanying family members that do not have an appointment to stay in the car as to encourage social distancing in the waiting area. We have hired a staff member to do a constant and extensive infection control protocol in the office as well as providing more complete personal protective equipment to our staff so that everyone is protected.

You will see some changes when its time for your next appointment. We made these changes to help protect you and our staff.

1. Please read the following questionnaire and if you have any Covid-19 symptoms please call us to reschedule your appointment to a later date.

• Do you have fever or have you felt hot or feverish recently (14-21 days)?
• Are you having shortness of breath or other difficulties breathing?
• Do you have a cough?
• Any other flu-like symptoms, such as gastrointestinal upset, headache or fatigue?
• Have you experienced recent loss of taste or smell?
• Are you in contact with any confirmed COVID-19 positive patients?
• Have you traveled in the past 14 days to any regions affected by COVID-19?

If you answered YES to any of the above questions, please call the office to reschedule your appointment.

2. We have a assigned a specific staff member to do extensive disinfection at the beginning and end of each day and in-between patients.

3. We will have hand sanitizer available that we will ask you to use upon arrival and we ask that you wear a mask while you wait. If you do not have one, a mask will be provided for you.

4. You may notice that our waiting room will no longer offer magazines or items that are touched frequently and are difficult to clean.

5. Appointments will be managed to allow for social distancing between patients. That might mean that you are offered fewer options for scheduling your appointments. We ask that you do your best to be on time and we in turn promise to decrease wait times as much as possible.

We look forward to seeing you again and are happy to answer any questions you may have about steps we are taking to keep you, and every patient, safe in our practice. Thank you for your kind understanding of this difficult situation. We value your trust and loyalty and look forward to welcoming you back.

Blue Coast Dental Group Team