Physical Distancing
Why yes, these are nifty new stickers we've placed around our office, thanks for noticing 😘. In most cases, we're limiting foot traffic in and around the office, so here's what you might expect:
On booking your appointment, don't be afraid to verify with our concierge team - whether it is a tele-dentistry appointment (conducted online with the Zoom Meeting video conferencing app) or if it is an in-person visit. While some of the appointments will be in-person at one of our offices, we are also offering a number of one-on-one bookings with your dentist through our tele-dentistry services, where applicable (for example, Invisalign® follow-ups, consultations regarding treatment you've discussed before, analysis and interpretation of acquired dental records and planning of future treatments, etc). If your appointment is booked for a Zoom meeting, the link to join will be sent to you on the day of your appointment. Please make sure you have Zoom installed onto your device. If it is your first time using Zoom, please sign in about 5-10 minutes before your video chat appointment to make sure everything is in order.
When booked at one of our offices, please arrive for your dental appointment alone. If someone has come with you, they will be asked to remain in the car - or this could be a good time for them to run some errands around the neighbourhood (just ask us how long the appointment will take first 😀). This is to reduce the number of people inside of our office and reduce the potential for transmission of germs and pathogenic microorganisms. Obviously, if special circumstances arise (e.g. young children, etc), we may allow entry for an additional family member. In cases where we require parental permission to proceed with a treatment or procedure for underage visitors who have come unaccompanied (e.g. x-rays for teenagers, who are able to attend their appointments independently), we will call their parents. Please update us with the most up-to-date contact number you have and make sure that phone is on. (It may seem unnecessary to mention this, however, someone who usually prefers to be contacted at work may be working from home during this pandemic, so please let us know the best number where we can reach you during this time).
Call us upon arrival to our office, (416) 226-6688 for the Willowdale Location or (416) 222-4762 for the Centerpoint Location. We will let you know if your room is ready or if more time is needed. Please use this time to check into our ALFIE Dentistry Patient Portal to see if you have any forms that need to be completed before your appointment. Here is a tutorial for how to navigate our patient portal. If you need wifi, our concierge team will help you connect from the safety of your car. All patients will be asked to complete a COVID-19 pre-screening form as well as an acknowledgement of the risks for dental visits during this time. Please read these online forms carefully and complete them before your visit. If you have already completed an acknowledgment during this time, you won't be asked to fill it out again. The COVID-19 prescreening form may need to be updated if enough time has elapsed since the last time you completed it. Other forms you may expect (depending on the reason for your visit) may include things like a medical history intake/update, privacy policy, insurance involvement, etc, so please allocate enough time to read these forms thoroughly and provide detailed answers. If you are taking any medications, please email us your most recent list before you come in for your appointment so that we can update it into our files. If for any reason, you do not have access to the online patient portal, you can still fill out paper forms when you arrive to our office. The clipboard is wiped down after each use and the pen you are given is new and yours to keep.
The inside environment may be a little different from what you have become accustomed to. We are minimizing high-traffic areas, so each patient who has an appointment booked will have their temperature taken at the entrance and then be led directly into their prepared treatment room. Please note that while we are working hard to stagger appointment times - so we don't have a group of people waiting to be checked out at the same time another group of people are waiting to enter our office - coordination can only take us so far before coincidences may lead people to be finished at the same time, may lead people to arrive early or late for their appointment and therefore coincide with another person's arrival/exit, and other 'traffic jams' at the front desk. Not to worry - we are still doing everything in our power to maintain proper physical distancing protocols between patients. You may be asked to wait outside our front door. You may be asked to exit out the side entrance. You may be seated in various areas of our office, away from other people - and this area will be treated with disinfectant wipes between each person who needs that seat. You may be asked to stay in your car a little bit longer than originally anticipated - for example: if we are waiting for someone to exit or if we are disinfecting the treatment room, if we are wiping down the high-touch areas of the front office, etc - so please be patient.
Checking out procedure We highly recommend that you have an email address on file. Then, instead of printed copies of your receipt and explanation of benefits from your insurance company (if applicable), you can ask us to email you these in PDF format. This eliminates the transfer of any hard-copies between persons - and obviously reduces transmission of potential germs. Please note that by default, we are still handing out print-outs, so you do have to ask for this service - but we'd be more than happy to switch you over to paperless. It will also help save trees - so let us know when you arrive at checkout 😃. Our point of service machine is set up to accept contactless tap payments - up to a certain amount. You can also ask our concierge about our free VIP Checkout service to eliminate the need for even coming close to our POS. Rest assured that if you do need to use the POS to punch in a PIN, that we use disinfectant wipes on it after each use. Together, we can keep each other safe, so if you have any questions or concerns (or even suggestions!) about the ways we are trying to contain the spread, don't hesitate to email us!
