Asymptomatic COVID-19 patients and possible screening before an emergency aerosol related endodontic protocols in dental clinic-A Review

Abstract

Dentistry is related to the cure of oral and dental infections, so exposure and proximity of dental practitioners to oral and nasal fluids of a patient is very obvious. Before you proceed for an aerosol-generating procedure like RCT, and crown preparations, diagnosis, and screening of COVID-19 is very important, as failure may end up infecting yourself and would become a source of infection to your patient community. Due to limitations of data, medicines, and PPE shortage all around the world, screening of asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19 is very troublesome but necessary. To avoid any silent positive patient, the possible way is to ensure mandatory testing of every patient before you treat it. As the door to door surveillance of COVID-19 patients seems near to impossible in the Pandemic era for densely populated developing countries like India. The possible screening regimes include personal surveillance and contact tracing in the very first appointments. So, on the basis of the knowledge and sources we have so far, we have tried to classify the asymptomatic patients seen in the clinics and their possible screening management there. As it is said classification of a disease, is the first step toward a deep understanding of it. After screening, suspects can be sent to more resourceful places for their managements, and incidences of community spread of the disease through dental clinics can be avoided.

Keywords

• aerosols
• antibody test
• covid-19 asymptomatic carriers
• screening in dentistry