In a blog post for New Dentist Now (6/29), Drs. Sara Spurlock and Jennifer Jenkins – graduates from the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry who together own Dental Design Studio in Norman, Oklahoma – explain the difficult decisions they made to prepare for the COVID-19 pandemic. They eventually decided to “push pause to gather and review research” so they “could establish protocols to safely treat patients while prioritizing the health and safety” of their team. They write, “Our ‘pause’ in effect became a reset. This break allowed us first to focus on what we could do while we determined how to get back to doing what we love, which is serve our community by providing integrative oral health care and a caring, supportive work environment in which to employ our team.” Spurlock and Jenkins add, “Once we felt as though we had a grasp on how to care for and support our team, we put our focus on how to maintain our business. Our number one core value, ‘We believe our work is important’ spurred us onward as we knew then and continue to believe dentistry is essential to maintaining overall health and well-being.” They conclude saying, “We are stronger together because of this reset and hope to be able to continue to lead our team, serve our patients, profession and community with even more compassion, grace, gratitude and empathy than ever before.”
Complete results from the ADA Health Policy Institute’s polling on how COVID-19 is affecting dental practices can be viewed at https://bit.ly/2BoVOGk.
Information for the public on what to expect as dental offices reopen may be found on ADA’s consumer website MouthHealthy.org.