TY - JOUR
AU - Goldrick, Niall Mc
AU - O'Keefe, Emma
PY - 2022
DA - March
TI - Surveillance of COVID-19 cases associated with dental settings using routine health data from the East of Scotland with a description of efforts to break chains of transmission from October 2020 to December 2021
DO - https://doi.org/10.1101/2022.03.11.22272263
AB - Introduction: Dental settings have been considered high risk settings for COVID-19. A Dental Public Health Team in South East Scotland have worked to risk assess the situation timeously to break chains of transmission. Aim: To present routine data produced from a contact tracing service for COVID-19 cases in the dental setting with a focus on transmission. Design: Observational retrospective analysis of a routine data set of COVID-19 cases associated with a dental setting reported via the national contact tracing system for two health board areas in the east of Scotland. Methods: COVID-19 cases were confirmed by PCR testing. Descriptive statistics are used to summarise the data collected over a 13-month period (Oct 2020-Dec 2021). A narrative presents themes identified during contact tracing that led to transmission within a dental setting and includes a case study. Results: A total of 811 incidents are included. No evidence of staff to patient transmission or vice versa was found in this study. Staff to staff transmission occurred in non-clinical areas contributing to 33% of total staff cases. Conclusion: Transmission of COVID-19 in a dental setting in the context of this study appears to be confined to non-clinical areas. Future pandemic plans should include tools to aid with implementation of guidance in non-clinical areas.
PB - medRxiv
UR - https://discovery.dundee.ac.uk/en/publications/95c4b877-593f-4b34-9c23-6b1e7825ad5d
KW - Coronavirus (COVID-19)
ER