At our dental practice, we take the health and safety of our clients very seriously. During these difficult times, we understand that many of our patients may be wondering about the techniques employed to ensure sterilization in a dental office.
There are many procedures we follow to disinfect surfaces and tools, as well as strict maintenance policies we employ to ensure our sterilization testing methods are sound. We base these sterilization and maintenance processes on guidelines set forth by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the American Dental Association (ADA).
Please read on to learn more about our dental sterilization routines.
We have a strict routine in place when it comes to cleaning our dental tools and surfaces. Our processes have been informed by the CDC and are as follows:
These straightforward procedures help us ensure that every tool, all equipment, and each surface that is utilized while we provide patient care is sterilized after the care is given.
We use dental autoclave sterilizers for our tools and equipment, and hospital-grade, EPA-registered disinfectants to sterilize contact surfaces. Personal protective equipment used as barrier coverings is discarded after each use.
Next, we will discuss how we maintain our sterilization standards.
Along with sterilizing our tools, equipment, and surfaces, we must maintain our sterilization equipment. We do so by following the steps provided by the ADA.
To ensure our sterilization machinery is functioning well, we use the following indicators:
All three of these indicators work in harmony and alert us to a failure in our sterilization process. If a failure is indicated, we immediately remove the piece of equipment in question and do not use it again until a reason for the failure is detected and corrected.
Our day to day cleaning and sterilization processes are taken seriously, as is our monitoring system. Through these, we ensure we are providing our patients, coworkers, and community at large with a clean and healthy environment.
We hope that after reading this, you understand sterilization of instruments in dentistry and our infection control in dental clinic monitoring procedures and you continue to rely on us for your dental work and that we see you soon.