Covid Office Updates & Consent

(please take a moment to read everything) 
For those who have visited the office - THANK YOU for just being awesome!  Thanks for all the positive energy and compliments - its been stressful and we are doing our best for everyone's safety

Dear Patients and Families

We hope this letter finds you and your family in good health. Our community is progressing through a season of uncertainty, and we are all looking forward to brighter days ahead, and resuming our normal habits and routines. While many things have changed, one thing has remained constant: our unyielding commitment to your safety and well-being.

Please take a moment to fill out the COVID Screening Questionnaire:

For current active patients - we kindly ask ONLY THE PATIENT COME INTO THE OFFICE.  As much as we love parents, guardians and siblings, was want to preserve the social distancing as much as possible and its best to minimize congregation of people in the office.  If you have any questions regarding treatment, please email me at salinsortho@gmail.com.

**we have extended office hours to include "slow times" where you will be the only person seen in the office (monday-friday)**  if you want to request these special "slow" times - please send us a direct message so we can make accomodations - salinsortho@gmail.com

You may see some changes when it is time for your next appointment. We made these changes to help protect our patients and staff. 

Infection Control Protocols

The application of the strictest, evidenced-based universal infection control measures has always been the top priority for our practice and you may have observed this during your previous visits to our office. Our infection control processes have been developed 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 our patients, families and team members safe.

We follow strict infection control guidelines formulated by the American Dental Association (ADA) and adheres to the recommendations put forth by the California Association of Orthodontist (CAO) and the American Association of Orthodontists (AAO), particularly with the intent to minimize the community transmission of coronavirus (COVID-19).

• Our office will communicate with you beforehand to ask some requisite screening questions via an online questionnaire (please fill out link above) to confirm that you are healthy enough to proceed with your planned visit to our office to receive orthodontic treatment. You’ll be asked those same questions again when you arrive in the office. We request your kind understanding if we need to reschedule your appointment secondary to concerns about your health and well-being.

• We have hand sanitizer available that we will encourage you 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 continue to encourage hand washing upon arrival at our office and you may use our patient bathroom for this purpose.

• We will be regularly cleaning and disinfecting hard surfaces in the reception area including door handles. We have also increased the frequency of professional cleanings performed in our office.

• You may see that our waiting room is not currently offering magazines and children’s books to peruse since those items are difficult to clean and disinfect. We promise to replenish these items for your continued comfort when it is safe to do so.

• Appointments will be continued to be managed to allow for appropriate social distancing between patients. This may mean that you’re offered fewer options for scheduling your appointment. We appreciate your continued understanding with respect to the availability of certain types of appointments.

• 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. To this end, we politely request that only one parent attend the office with a young child for treatment. While we usually love seeing siblings, we request that they do not accompany our active patients to our office during this pandemic period.

• We may ask you to do a pre-procedural mouth rinse with Peroxyl. Not all patients will be asked to do this, just patients who are having specific procedures with an elevated risk of aerosol generation as recommended by the American Association of Orthodontists. Peroxyl is an oral cleanser over-the-counter at most pharmacies, which contains an active ingredient of 1.5% hydrogen peroxide that is manufactured by Colgate. We will let you know if you need to undertake a Peroxyl rinse.

Appointments

If we need to reschedule your appointment, we will contact you to arrange your new appointment. If you don’t hear from us this week, and you believe your appointment may need to be rescheduled, please contact our office on (510) 475-4153 (UC)/ (650) 952-1010 (SSF)/ (510) 972-3846 (office cell)   or salinsortho@gmail.com

We are unable to provide orthodontic treatment to anyone who is a confirmed COVID-19 case, is suspected they may have COVID-19 or they have come into contact with a confirmed or suspected COVID-19 case. If you are unsure, or even if you have cold and flu-like symptoms, please contact our office on (510) 475-4153 (UC)/ (650) 952-1010 (SSF)/ (510) 972-3846 (office cell) to reschedule your appointment.  It is safer for our clinic and the community as a whole, if we defer your appointment by a few weeks, where there is even the slightest potential for COVID-19 transmission. 

Contact us with any questions

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. We can be contacted on (510) 475-4153 (UC)/ (650) 952-1010 (SSF)/ (510) 972-3846 (office cell) or by email to salinsortho@gmail.com. 

Finally, thank you for continuing to entrust your orthodontic care to our experienced team. We sincerely appreciate your trust and loyalty and very much look forward to welcoming you back into our practice.

Yours sincerely

Sheldon Salins DMD MS