Dentaltown June 2020 - 8

professional courtesy
column

There Are Heroes
in Dentistry, Too
The war against COVID-19 continues around the
world and while leading indicators provide evidence of
progress, the fight is far from over.
There will be another surge of illness and tragic loss.
As a small business owner, I cannot ignore the economic
disaster that we will fight next. This new reality came
in focus as I prepared to open my practice, PPP-positive
and antibody-negative.
As spring turns to summer, we'll learn where we
stand in the dental food chain and allies will be clear.
Remember all the talk of Amazon taking over the dental
supply business? This crisis has put the major dental
distributors front and center. Henry Schein, Benco
and Patterson, to name a few, have the relationships
with manufacturers, the bandwidth to properly vet
new suppliers and the infrastructure to move massive
quantities across the country.
The return to comprehensive care is fueled by access
to personal protective equipment, and your supply
relationship will matter. Initially, supplies must be
rationed and they're typically going to practices based
on prior business. Never ordered from a particular
distributor? Don't expect a return phone call in the
early days and weeks. This will be frustrating, but it's
business-loyal customers go to the front of the line.
My practice was limited to a few emergency patients
a day for six weeks, which provided plenty of time to
be in contact with various manufacturers and service
providers. I had a variety of experiences, good and bad,
but every interaction left me with the same impression:
I hope they learned something from this crisis.
This wasn't the world hitting a
pause button; it was a wake-up call
to rethink your business operation.
Preparing for the reopening of my
practice has forced me to identify
processes we can change to minimize
potential patient crowding and provide
a contactless check-in and check-out
process. We're changing the schedule,
emailing treatment plans, collecting
by phone before appointment, having

patients update health history
forms from a secure link at home,
providing e-statements with a link to
pay by credit card and more.
The silver lining in this mess is the
freedom to change things we've done one
way for so long and the happy discovery that the new
way might be better.
Nothing will be accomplished in your practice
unless your dental team is with you and ready to work.
Many organizations and respected educators have
shared guidance on the path back to practice. I was
disappointed to read a letter from the Arizona Dental
Hygienists' Association that was sent to our governor
10 days after he announced dental offices could reopen
by May 1. The line that stood out to me: "Even with
proper precautions, we don't know enough about the
virus to go back to providing non-essential care."
I happen to believe hygienists provide a vital service
to patients. Referring to the services they provide as
"non-essential" is a big mistake and only serves to
validate the half of our population that avoids going
to the dentist for preventive care.
To be fair, two paragraphs later was this statement:
"Dental hygienists understand that not providing
preventive care and treatment for early forms of dental
disease for many patients may very well result in increased
complexity and cost for treatment down the road."
Oh, well-too bad for the patients in that group.
Dentistry was a dangerous profession long before the
COVID-19 pandemic and this event has renewed our
focus on a safe working environment that is essential
for every member of our team. The world is celebrating
heroes both inside and outside of health care: nurses,
physicians, EMS workers, fi rst responders, delivery
drivers, grocery store employees, restaurant workers,
utility companies and more. I like to think that the
dental team belongs on that list, too.
What do you think? Please share your comments and
your experiences about returning to work in the comments
section underneath this article online at Dentaltown.com.

by Thomas Giacobbi, DDS, FAGD, editorial director, Dentaltown magazine

8

JUNE 2020 // dentaltown.com

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Dentaltown June 2020

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