Coronavirus: FGDP releases interim advice for primary care
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- Published: Thursday, 13 February 2020 07:31
- Written by News Editor
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The Faculty of General Dental Practice (FGDP(UK)) is encouraging dental practices to take note of interim advice for primary care on coronavirus. The Department of Health guidance aims to help reduce the risk of the spread of infection during and following contact with patients with suspected Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), and Public Health England has published an accompanying flowchart.
They advise that if patients display even minor symptoms of cough, fever or shortness of breath within 14 days of returning to the UK from China, Thailand, Japan, Korea, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Singapore, Malaysia or Macau, they should be isolated with their belongings in a side room with the door closed, and should not be physically examined. If an examination or appointment has already started, practitioners should leave the room, wash their hands and seek specialist advice from a local microbiologist, virologist, or infectious diseases physician.
In both cases, staff and visitors should be informed not to enter the isolation room, and the patient should be instructed to immediately call NHS 111 if in England or Wales, their GP or NHS 24 if in Scotland, or 0300 200 7885 if in Northern Ireland, preferably on their own mobile phone. The patient should not be allowed to use communal toilet facilities, and further communication with the patient should be carried out by phone if possible.
Anyone who has had contact with a confirmed case of Coronavirus in the previous 14 days, even if they themselves are asymptomatic, should be reported to the local health protection team immediately.
Work is now underway, led by the Deputy Chief Dental Officer for England and Director of Dental Public Health for England, to develop dentistry-specific guidance, and the Chief Dental Officer for England has been appointed Chair of the NHS Primary Care Taskforce for 2019-nCoV response.
Ian Mills FFGDP(UK), Dean of the Faculty, has joined an NHS England working group to develop plans for dentistry, pharmacy and optometry in case of a greater outbreak of the virus.
Corona Virus...
!0-30000 people die in the UK on average from Flu per year.....Consider the fact before the curtain came down...lots of people from the Hubei province and the rest of China were streaming into the uK going to department stores etc.... Unless you have a cough and a mild fever and knowingly come into contact with a known person diagnosed with the Corona Virus outbreak, would anyone think that they have been affected.... In other words how many cases are out there? Only if you die or become seriously ill , would they even consider testing you! Furthermore, relatively few have died outside China. There are probably hundreds of thousands if not millions of people affected in China.... the death rate is not huge....most recover..... If you are immune suppressed,old, heart conditions then you are more likely to be at risk of death....I
Corona Virus advice for Dental Practices....
Hmmm....and if the patient refuses your immediate quarantine at the Practice, what then ???OK who has a spare side-room and who has the direct number of a microbiologist to call for advice too ?!?
I’m not sure this has been properly thought through - I’ll stop there but I’d be doing a lot more practically given our Professional expertise AND our already active X-infn proactivity, routine ppe etc, etc.
Yours realistically,
Tony.
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