Here are four stories covered by Becker's Dental + DSO Review on COVID-19-related advice from the California Dental Association since Jan. 12.
1. For patients who refuse to comply with mask mandates, the CDA outlines several ways to avoid mask compliance issues, including training employees on how to handle uncooperative patients, designating a specific team member to quickly address noncompliance situations and offering unmasked patients the option to reschedule when they are willing to comply, among others suggestions.
2. To motivate dental staff to get vaccinated against COVID-19, practice owners can cover costs associated with getting vaccinated and provide paid time off to recover from potential side effects, among other efforts. Click here to view the full list of tactics.
3. The CDA suggests dental practice owners address COVID-19 fatigue among their staff by fostering an atmosphere of trust, modeling best practices on clinical protocols and healthy ways to practice stress, and being direct when responding to employees who fail to comply with COVID-19-related safety protocols.
4. Despite CDC's Feb. 10 recommendation that called for double masking among the general public, the CDA urged dental practices to continue following industry-specific PPE recommendations, which call for the use face shields and National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health-certified respirators to best protect patients and staff.