Coronavirus Update

Our Office’s Safety Precautions

At this point masking is still required in all health care facilities.

At Perio4U we are committed to your safety and health and infection control has always been a top priority for us, and you may have seen this during your visits to our office. After COVID-19 outbreak we have implemented additional infection control measures to ensure your safety and peace of mind. We want to let you know about the infection control procedures we follow in our practice to keep you and our team safe.

Our office follows infection control recommendations made by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). We follow the recommendations of the American Dental Association (ADA), California Dental association (CDA) and Santa Clara County Public Health Department so that we are up to date on any new rulings or guidance that may be issued.

As we want to welcome you back into our office, we wanted to let you know what measures we have taken to protect our patients and our team and what changes to expect. The following are some examples:

• Our office will communicate with you beforehand to ask some screening questions to make sure you are not sick. You will be asked those same questions again when you arrive in the office. 
• We will cancel the appointments of any patients with COVID-like symptoms such as fever, chills, coughing, sneezing, or loss of taste and smell. We will also cancel the appointments of any patients who have been in contact with a COVID-19 patient within the past 2 weeks. If you have been diagnosed with COVID-19 or have been in close contact with someone diagnosed with COVID-19, we will request physician clearance before re-appointing you at our office. Any of our team members experiencing flu-like symptoms will be required to stay home and not come to work until cleared by a doctor.
• Please call the office from your car when you arrive to make sure we are ready for you before you come inside the office. Your companions need to stay in the car and wait. We are taking this measure to minimize the contact between individuals and allow for social distancing.
• Please cover your face with a mask and/or cloth when entering the building.
• We have hand sanitizer that we will ask you to use when you enter our practice. 
• We will take your temperature when you arrive and anyone exhibiting an elevated temperature will be rescheduled. 
• We have implemented a “No Handshaking Policy” at our office.
• You may see that our waiting room will no longer offer magazines, cookies, coffee, tea, children’s toys and so forth, for safety reasons. 
• We clean the lobby and reception room area, bathrooms, doorknobs, seat handles and surgical rooms on a regular basis with disinfectants. 
• You will be greeted by our front office staff who will be wearing mask and shield as well.
• Appointments will be managed to allow for social distancing between patients. We may also need to allow certain procedures to be done at specific times of the day. This might mean that you are offered fewer options for scheduling your appointment. 
• We are increasing the time that we allocate for each service. 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 have installed a UV light unit in the ductwork of our central air system which scrubs the air as it passes by, eliminating viruses and bacteria.
• We have air purifiers with HEPA filter and UV light in each operatory and around the office that clean the office air throughout the day.
• We have installed two Plexiglass sneeze shields in the front office area to protect you and our staff.
• We have ordered high suction power units to reduce the aerosol formation in the office. We will use those with procedures that produce aerosols as needed.
• We use Fogger with Hypochlorous acid after aerosol producing procedures to decontaminate the rooms.
• We are changing our personal protective equipment (PPEs) between each patient.
• Before seeing each patient, we wash our hands with soap  and or sanitizer and put on a new gown, gloves and mask.
• We ask you to rinse your mouth with a disinfectant before any procedure.
• We dispose of any used disposable materials like suctions, surface barriers, sutures, blades, gloves and gowns and never reuse them.
• We are cleaning all the treatment room surfaces after each patient with hospital grade disinfectants that kill 99.9% of bacteria, spores and viruses.
• We are packing and sterilizing all the dental instruments that contact any patient and/or procedural aerosols with hospital grade autoclave equipment, as we have always done. 
• Our sterilizing equipment is tested on a weekly basis by an independent company to ensure the accuracy and efficacy of our sterilization processes. 

As you might know, some of the aggressive bacteria in your mouth that causes gum disease, can travel throughout your body and affect other organs. Oral bacteria have been associated with plaque formation in heart arteries, stroke, septicemia, premature birth of a baby and even Alzheimer’s disease. Therefore, it is important for our patients to continue to receive necessary dental treatment and preventive maintenance. We hope that our communication will make you feel better about your future visits with us and it will provide you with confidence that our practice is one of the safest places to be at this point. Your health and safety are our priority and we will do everything we can to protect you while you are in our care. We value your trust and loyalty and look forward to welcoming you back into our practice. 

Thank you for giving us a chance to be your partner in health. We look forward to seeing you again and are happy to answer any questions you may have about the steps we are taking to keep you and every patient in our practice safe. To make an appointment, please call our office at (408) 998-8008 or visit our website at wwwperio4u.com.  

Looking forward to seeing you,

Dr. Niloofar Zarkesh
Dr. Christine Hayashi
Dr. Adrienne Gunstream 
and the Perio4U team