Cross-Infection and Infection Control in Dentistry PDF

Dental care

Table of Contents
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
Pre operational instructions prior to treatment.............................................................................3
Supporting children, older patients with special needs in event of XLA/ MOS..........................3
Support offered to children while extracting deciduous tooth.....................................................3
Importance of patients medical history........................................................................................4
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................1

MAIN BODY
Pre operational instructions prior to treatment.
People should not drink, eat or chew anything such as water, chewing tobacco, mints,
candy, gum, etc. for approximately 8 to 12 hours prior to treatment. In case of local anaesthetic,
people are allowed to take a light meal 2 hours in advance and also brush and floss thoroughly
before the surgery. Patient should take prescribed medicine only after consulting the doctor.
Patient should not consume alcohol 24 hours prior to XLA/ MOS and should also refrain from
smoking for 12 hours prior to XLA/ MOS. Patients should thoroughly brush their teeth and
should also report to the physicians in case of any health changes like cough, fever, rash or cold
(Pre-Operative Instructions: Local Anesthesia, 2019). If patients do not follow pre operational
instruction then surgery will not be carried out at any preferred risk. Pre operational instructions
is very useful as it helps in ensuring that patient is ready to go under specific surgery. It also
helps in highlighting issues that surgical team needs to be caution or aware of at the time of pre-
operative period in order to ensure safety of the patient (Kebriaee and et.al., 2015).
Supporting children, older patients with special needs in event of XLA/ MOS.
Doctors should perform brief physical examination and analyse the medical history of the
patient. Dental practitioners should focus on gaining information about the various medical
condition of the patient. It should also evaluate intake of medications, drug allergies, prior
adverse reaction to anaesthesia (Suda and et.al, 2019). It helps doctors to select the best
anaesthetic agents and specified dosage in order to avoid complications. Proper treatment and
dosage should be given to the children, older patients with special needs in event of XLA/ MOS.
Support offered to children while extracting deciduous tooth.
Dental practitioners must focus on space maintainer if the child looses the tooth early or
has been extracted due to dental decay. Space maintainer is useful in supporting the dental health
of a child. Space maintainer helps permanent tooth to come into exact place and space (Pala,
Nuvvula and Kamatham, 2016).
Health and Safety at Work Act (1974), lays down specific legislations which are relevant
to the dental workplace. It helps in protecting patients and practitioners from hazardous
equipment and harmful chemicals (Renton and Master, 2016). Control of Substances Hazardous
to Health Regulations (COSHH) that helps in protecting people against various health risk from
hazardous substances. Dental practitioners should focus on maintaining effective controlling

measures in order to reduce risk. Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurrences
Regulations, 1995 states that, employees must keep proper records of certain incidents and
accidents that happened within the workplace. Special waste and hazardous waste regulations,
states that special waste is referred to as any solid waste which is due to its chemical
characteristics and biological properties require special disposal and handling. Hazardous waste
is classified as hard or soft clinical waste, X-ray, dental, sharps and special waste are medicines.
Decontamination in primary dental care focuses on raising the quality and standard of
decontamination work in primary dental care by effectively reusing the instruments related with
dental facilities (Willink, Schoen and Davis, 2017). It is very useful in reducing cross infection
which in turn results in better dental care and practice.
Cross infection are caused by virus, bacteria, parasites and fungus which are already
present in patient's body or come from contaminated hospital equipments, environment, health
care workers, etc. (Ibrahim and et.al., 2017). Transmission of infection from one individual to
another can be due to saliva, blood, inoculation, droplet inhalation, direct or indirect contact,
infected material, contact of conjunctival, oral mucosa, nasal, airborne, vector, etc. Temperature
can affect the growth of microorganism. If the temperature is high, then microorganism can grow
easily up to a certain point (Samuel and Priyadarshoni, S.P., 2019). Very low and very high
temperature obstructs the enzyme process upon which microorganism depend to survive.
Importance of patients medical history
Protecting various health information and keeping complete health records is very useful
in providing the best medical care to the patients. Medical history plays a crucial role in dentistry
as it increases dentist awareness of medication and disease which might interfere with the dental
treatment of patient (McQuistan and et.al., 2015). Example, if a patient has medical illness such
as diabetes then it may affect the dental treatment and results in various health problems such as
tooth decay, taste impairment, delayed healing, gum disease, fungal infections and taste
impairment.
A patients dental records are to be kept for the minimum of 5 years. Records of
sterilization and auditing need to be stored in dentistry in order to determine the proper
functioning and health care specification in the workplace. Dental compliance specialist focuses
on auditing and inspecting dental practices (Johansson and et.al., 2017). Patient can easily access
to their dental records and government can inspect for sterilization and audit dental practice.

REFERENCES
Books and journals
Ibrahim, N.K and et.al., 2017. Cross-infection and infection control in dentistry: Knowledge,
attitude and practice of patients attended dental clinics in King Abdulaziz University
Hospital, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Journal of infection and public health.10(4). pp.438-445.
Johansson, A.K and et.al., 2017. Dental erosion. In Pediatric Dentistry: a Clinical Approach, 3rd
Edition (pp. 161-173). Wiley-Blackwell.
Kebriaee, F and et.al., 2015. Comparison of the effects of cognitive behavioural therapy and
inhalation sedation on child dental anxiety. European Archives of Paediatric
Dentistry.16(2). pp.173-179.
McQuistan, M.R and et.al., 2015. Oral health knowledge among elderly patients. The Journal of
the American Dental Association. 146(1). pp.17-26.
Pala, S.P., Nuvvula, S. and Kamatham, R., 2016. Expression of pain and distress in children
during dental extractions through drawings as a projective measure: a clinical study. World
journal of clinical pediatrics.5(1). p.102.
Renton, T. and Master, S., 2016. The complexity of patient safety reporting systems in UK
dentistry. British dental journal.221(8). p.517.
Samuel, D.S. and Priyadarshoni, S.P., 2019. Use of Infection Control Protocol among Dental
Setup in Chennai. Research Journal of Pharmacy and Technology.12(5). pp.2517-2521.
Suda, G.J and et.al, 2019. System and method for providing dental treatment recommendations.
U.S. Patent Application 10/242,157.
Willink, A., Schoen, C. and Davis, K., 2017. Consideration of dental, vision, and hearing
services to be covered under Medicare. Jama.318(7). pp.605-606.
Online
Pre-Operative Instructions: Local Anesthesia. 2019. [Online]. Available through:
<https://www.unionsquareoralsurgery.com/instructions/pre-operative-instructions-local-
anesthesia/>
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