Office Procedures

May 15, 2020

Dear Patients, 

We can’t wait to see you in office. As we do our best to navigate safely re-opening our practice during these unprecedented times, we wanted to give you a better idea of what to expect on you next visit. 

Forms: Everyone will be asked to complete the Health & Wellness Forms below before your upcoming appointment. We will need to have these forms completed in order to see you. If you are experiencing any of the COVID-19 symptoms indicated below, or if your forms are not completed before your appointment, we will reschedule your appointment for a future date.

Tooth Brush Station closed: Please brush before your visit. Our tooth brush station will now be used for hand washing ONLY.

Call or Text on Arrival: At this time, our reception area has limited seating. To help with social distancing and the pre-screening process, please arrive 10 minutes early to your appointment and remain in your car. Send us a text reply or call us when you arrive. We will text or call you when we are ready for you to come to our screening station. To limit exposure, we are asking that ONLY those with an appointment come in to the office. Additional guests will be asked to wait outside. 

Wear a Mask: We are asking that all patients and guardians wear a face mask (or the like) when they arrive to our practice. While we have missed you and would like nothing more than to hug you or shake your hand, please understand that for your safety, we are limiting physical contact at this time. 

Screening Station: The screening station will be set-up in our reception area, before you enter the treatment room. You will be asked if any of the information on the forms you completed has changed. We will also be taking the temperature of each patient and parent with a touchless and/or forehead thermometer to verify nobody has a fever. Please let us know in advance if you tend to run hot/cold! 

Limited Capacity: At this time, we are scheduling at a limited capacity and we will do everything possible to ensure our patients maintain proper social distancing during their appointments. 

Cleanliness: We have always maintained the highest standards when it comes to sterilization and cleanliness, but we have added additional safety measures. We have added extra time in between appointments to sanitize and sterilize all equipment and surfaces as well. 

Check-Out: Our staff will come to you in the treatment room to schedule your next appointment, take any additional payment due, and answer any administrative questions. We will try to keep the process as contactless as possible. 

We appreciate your patience while we modify and perfect our protocols.

May 11, 2020

Dear Patient

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.

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 office will communicate with you beforehand to ask some screening questions. You’ll be asked those same questions again when you are in the office.
• 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.
• 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.
• Appointments will be managed to allow for social distancing between patients.
• 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.

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. A member from our team will be contacting you to schedule or confirm your appointment.

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. Bartley, Dr. Fontanez and Team