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Managing the Oral Health of Cancer Patients During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Perspective of a Dental Clinic in a Cancer Center

Authors :
Wesley L. Hicks
Kimberly E. Wooten
Heidi C. Crow
Sebastiano Andreana
Marym Abdelmaseh
Anurag K. Singh
Nirmala Tasgaonkar
Vishal Gupta
Michael Hess
Sunita Manuballa
Vladimir Frias
Mukund Seshadri
Michael R. Markiewicz
Source :
Journal of Clinical Medicine, Vol 9, Iss 3138, p 3138 (2020), Journal of Clinical Medicine, Volume 9, Issue 10
Publication Year :
2020
Publisher :
MDPI AG, 2020.

Abstract

The practice of dentistry has been dramatically altered by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Given the close person-to-person contact involved in delivering dental care and treatment procedures that produce aerosols, dental healthcare professionals including dentists, dental assistants and dental hygienists are at high risk of exposure. As a dental clinic in a comprehensive cancer center, we have continued to safely provide medically necessary and urgent/emergent dental care to ensure that patients can adhere to their planned cancer treatment. This was accomplished through timely adaptation of clinical workflows and implementation of practice modification measures in compliance with state, national and federal guidelines to ensure that risk of transmission remained low and the health of both immunocompromised cancer patients and clinical staff remained protected. In this narrative review, we share our experience and measures that were implemented in our clinic to ensure that the oral health needs of cancer patients were met in a timely manner and in a safe environment. Given that the pandemic is still on-going, the impact of our modified oral healthcare delivery model in cancer patients warrants continued monitoring and assessment.

Details

Language :
English
ISSN :
20770383
Volume :
9
Issue :
3138
Database :
OpenAIRE
Journal :
Journal of Clinical Medicine
Accession number :
edsair.doi.dedup.....7c4b82bb2a2358913e092919adc04546