Dental practice during the era of COVID-19 pandemic: An Egyptian experience.

CONFLICT OF INTEREST

None to declare.

AUTHOR CONTRIBUTIONS

Shereen Ali: Conceptualization; Methodology; Writing‐original draft; Writing‐review & editing.

ETHICAL APPROVAL

The study was approved by Ethics Committee of Faculty of Dentistry, Cairo University, Egypt.

PEER REVIEW

The peer review history for this article is available at https://publons.com/publon/10.1111/odi.13898.

Dear Editor,

The dental office is among the highest risk settings for COVID‐19 disease transmission due to the nature of the dental practice, which generate a cloud of splatters (Ahmed et al., 2020; Al‐Khalifa et al., 2020; Cagetti et al., 2020).

We investigated the effect of COVID‐19 pandemic on the dental practice of Egyptian dentists using an online questionnaire created via Google Forms. The link was circulated through social networking applications (WhatsApp and Facebook). The questionnaire and the study were approved by Ethics Committee of Faculty of Dentistry, Cairo University, Egypt. The first section of the questionnaire gathered the demographic data. The second section assessed dentists' knowledge about COVID‐19. The third section focused on the effect of COVID‐19 pandemic on the dental practice.

A total of 512 dentists received the questionnaire, and 238 dentists responded with response rate of 46.5%. Among the 238 responses, 12 dentists refused to share their responses and 226 dentists accepted to share their responses. Demographic data are shown in Figure 1.

FIGURE 1

Demographic data

Almost all participants (98.2%) are aware of the mode of COVID‐19 transmission. Many participants (65.5%) are updated with the CDC or WHO guidelines for COVID‐19 disease, and others (15%) are not sure. Half of the participants (52.2%) are aware of which authority to contact if they come across a suspected COVID‐19 patient.

Concerning the sources of information, the Internet and social sites such as Facebook (83.2%) with the official websites (80.5%) collected the highest percent. Television (69.5%), physicians (68.1%), and social groups such as WhatsApp (57.1%) came next. Although most of the participants work in universities, the academic journals (55.3%) and institutional seminars (33.2%) ranked at the end.

With the disease outbreak, 53.1% of the participants stopped their dental practice and 34.1% of the participants operated emergency dental care only. The duration of restriction was diverse ranging from <1–7 months. Many participants (78.3%) defer dental treatment of patients showing suspicious symptoms.

About the safe procedures, many participants (71.7%) agreed on emergency procedures. Endodontic procedures were selected by 43.8% of the participants, followed by surgical procedures (36.7%), and then restorative and aesthetic procedures (33.2%), and 21.2% of the dentists stated that all dental procedures are safe.

Many dentists (78.3%) noticed a decrease in patients' flow on resuming dental practice. Almost all the dentists ask their patients to wear a face mask in the waiting area; regularly (82.3%) or irregularly (16.4%). Concerning social distancing in the waiting area, 53.1% of the dentists maintain this practice all the time, and 23.45% follow this practice every now and then.

Most of the participants routinely follow the universal precautions of infection control for every patient (87.6%) and changed their infection control routine after the pandemic (81.9%).

Close assessment reflected some deficits. Many dentists wash their hands with soap or use sanitizer before and after treatment of every patient (80.5%) or some patients (15.1%). Concerning the use of high‐volume suction, 44.2% of the dentists use it with every patient and 28.8% of the dentists use it every now and then. Regarding the rubber dam, 29.6% of the dentists use it with every patient and 30.1% of the dentists use it irregularly.

All participants wear disposable gloves and face mask. Many participants (74.8%) think N‐90 mask should be routinely worn in dental practice. However, only 47.8% of them wear N‐90 mask for every patient and 16.4% wear N‐90 mask from time to time. Many participants wear disposable gowns (76.1%) and safety glasses (69.5%), and fewer participants wear disposable headsets (45.1%).

Participants prefer official websites than academic journals to enrich their knowledge about the pandemic. COVID‐19 pandemic has a great impact on the dental practice, and it restricted the elective dental care during the first outbreak and introduced new normal to the waiting area and the personal protective equipment.