Review Article

Year : 2016 | Volume : 1 | Issue : 1 | Page : 37-41

Dental Office Design and Waste Care Management in Infection Control

Sindhuja Krishnan, Saravana Pandian1

Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopaedics, Madha Dental College, Dr. MGR University, 1 Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopaedics, Saveetha Dental College, Saveetha University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India

Address for correspondence:

Dr. Sindhuja Krishnan,

Department of Orthodontics and Dentofacial Orthopaedics, Madha Dental College, Dr. MGR University, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India.

E‐Mail: reachsindhuja@yahoo.com

Abstract

Infection control is the most vital and fundamental aspect of health-care practice pertaining to the faculties of medicine, surgery, or dentistry. The nature of dental procedures involves occupational exposure to blood and saliva that might carry these microorganisms. Dental health‐care professionals and dental patients are, therefore, at a high risk for developing infectious diseases. This article emphasizes the importance of infection control in a dental office. It describes the protocol to be followed in a dental clinic setup. Steps in health care waste management have also been discussed. It is extremely important for a dentist to follow a protocol to facilitate cross‐infection control in the office and to prevent cross-contamination between the patients, dentists, assistants, and ancillary staff. Personal protection, decontamination/sterilization of instruments and materials, and formulation of an infection control policy have been discussed.

Keywords: Cross-infection, dental clinic, dentistry, disinfection, sterilization

Financial support and sponsorship

Nil.

Conflicts of interest

There are no conflicts of interest.

How to cite this article: Krishnan S, Pandian S. Dental office design and waste care management in infection control. Int J Pedod Rehabil 2016;1:37-41.