Please note: The Governor’s restrictions on non-urgent medical and dental procedures still remain in effect.

Over the past month, Washington dentists have followed state-mandated guidelines to halt non-urgent dental care while continuing to provide emergent care to our patients. We have done this in concert with other health care providers to ensure sufficient levels of PPE for our state’s hospitals and first responders during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The threat of disease spread is not over, and Washington dentists should continue to follow public health mandates from state authorities. However, discussions around protocols and guidance for the return to providing increasingly needed non-urgent and routine care have begun.

For the last several days, leaders from ADA and WSDA have been actively involved in these important conversations.

This week, a broad-based group of health care organizations in our state, including WSDA, developed “recommendations for health system reactivation.” These recommendations, which were shared with state authorities yesterday, focus on four key principles:

• Harms are generated both by morbidity and mortality from COVID-19 and from deferred access to needed healthcare services.
• Easing of restrictions on elective patient care and surgery may be safely undertaken in advance of easing society-at-large restrictions. With appropriate use of science-based protocols for social distancing, stringent universal precautions, and situation-appropriate PPE-use, we can and will make our elective patient care spaces among the safest places for Washingtonians to be at this time.
• Access to sustainable PPE levels is key to easing restrictions on elective patient care. At the same time, capacity needs to be preserved in the event of disease resurgence, once general social restrictions are eased. We are prepared to work collaboratively and transparently with our colleagues, institutions, and regulatory agencies to ensure that we maintain adequate supply chain capacity for possible COVID-19 patient care, while servicing our mission of healing.
• Once opened, health care organizations of all types will continue to follow evolving Department of Health guidelines and recommendations. Unless otherwise directed, decision making around operational process and delivery of specific services should reside, as it did before the closure, with individual health care organizations, the clinicians involved, and their patients.

View Recommendations for Health System Reactivation
Let me be clear, at this point in time, these are only recommendations that have been shared with state authorities. The Governor’s restrictions on non-urgent medical and dental procedures still remain in effect.

Beyond general health care guidance, the dental community is working diligently to develop specific recommendations for appropriate protocols (PPE use, patient screening, etc.) for re-opening dental offices for non-urgent care once offices are permitted to do so.

Last week, ADA President Dr. Chad Gehani convened an Advisory Task Force on Dental Practice Recovery. This group is developing updated COVID-19 practice guidelines for various categories of dental procedures. We are thankful that leadership from this group actively participated in the “recommendations” development discussion we had with other Washington state health care organizations. ADA currently has Interim Guidance for Minimizing Risk of COVID-19 Transmission that we encourage all dental professionals to review. 

Finally, we have received several inquiries from members asking about PPE availability and COVID-19 testing. We are actively working on these issues and will share updates when possible. We all will be entering a new “normal” when we return to providing routine, non-urgent care. WSDA will do everything in our power to address PPE supply and COVID-19 testing issues that arise over the next several months.

I know that this email does not answer everyone’s questions during this uncertain time. Information and resources are changing rapidly, and we are continuously working to provide more complete answers while advocating for you, your staff, and your patients.

Sincerely,