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HYGIENE TRIBUNE The World’s Dental Hygiene Newspaper ·U.S. Edition December 2014 — Vol. 7, No. 7 www.dental-tribune.com By Patricia Walsh, RDH, Hygiene Tribune Editor in Chief T hey say “a miss is as good as a mile.” Last week, in my New Eng- land dental practice, a miss was as good as 15. I no longer keep my cell phone in my lab coat pocket. While rethinking every infection control step in the office, I had decided that my email ob- session was germ laden. No more glancing at a screen in the hallway while the doctor is using the Velscope light. I may not be susceptible to a missed enterovirus, but what about the child in my chair? What if I missed cleaning a patch of fingertip? Prior to my 10 a.m. patient, I went into the staff room for my mid-morning hard boiled egg. I thought about how studies have shown that the “germiest” part of an office isn’t the bathroom, but the staff room door knob. Weeat,wetouchourface.Ijokeaboutmy mid-morning snacks coming with a Purell chaser now. What percentage alcohol is it? At my age it is perhaps the closest thing I’ll ever get to a Jell-O shot. I pulled my phone out of my purse and there it was. An NBC newsflash. A Yale graduate student, back from setting up computer software in West Africa, had been admitted to the hos- pital for Ebola testing. I brought the screen out to our receptionist with the warning “don’t say anything.” My fear being that a patient might hear her gasp. While Mr. Duncan still lay suffering in Dallas, I was reading ”The Hot Zone.” A best seller from more than 20 years ago, it doc- uments the discovery of the Ebola virus. I thought it was scarier than a Stephen King novel, mostly because it wasn’t fiction. It was all fact. I speculated that my patients would be glued to their television screens and not come in for their dental appointments. What I experienced instead was what I now dub the “9/11 effect.” Not only did they come in for their appointments, but they couldn’t wait to talk about the “big event.” Every single patient in my sched- ule, with the exception of a 6-year-old, sat in the chair and started to say, “Did you hear about that Yale student?” I could see the fear in their eyes. One patient told me she had just gotten off the phone with her daughter, who was a panic-stricken preschool teacher. Patients looked to me for infection-control information. They looked to me for reassurance in our com- munity. Suddenly, I became the tribal medicine woman, the earth mother. My nursing abilities kicked in. The soothing voice usually reserved for toddlersbecame the tone of the day. What really surprised me was my pa- tients’ ready confidence in me. They felt as if anyone in health care would somehow be knowledgeable about every aspect of an international infectious disease. The Ebola experts will readily admit there is a great deal they don’t even know. It’s a double- edged sword and a huge responsibility. On the one hand, we are expected to display calmness and compassion above all else. On the other hand, when we show our hu- manness via frailty, misjudgment or mis- information — the public is not so forgiv- ing. They blame the nurse. By 5 p.m. I was back in the staff room looking at my phone. Twitter was report- ing that the Yale student had tested nega- tive. Germ carrier or not, I loved my phone again. This tidbit of information was very reassuring to my final patient of the day. An older man with a heavy Vietnamese ac- cent, he was no different than every other concerned patient of the day. Did I hear about Ebola at Yale? I sighed a sigh of relief because I had factual information to put his mind at ease. Twitter beat out the news networks by hours. The patient talked to me about the abject poverty in many Afri- can nations and the terrible problems with disease. We talked about superstitions in some developing countries being prob- lematic. He had never heard of this Ebola before. Had it been around long — and how did it get its name? As luck would have it, I remembered the historical facts in “The Hot Zone” and ended my day on a less frightening note. I could tell him the dis- ease had been studied for about 30 years and that there was an Ebola River in Zaire. The unofficial state song of Connecti- cut is “Boola Boola,” the Yale football fight song. By the end of the week, we were all breathing a bit easier and joking Boola Boola yes, Ebola, no. And there was more good news. The Associated Press had de- cided that announcing every single hospi- tal admission with “Ebola-like symptoms” was perhaps not such a good idea after all. Controlling fear, not just infection Commentary Toothbrushing: There’s an app for that Crest Oral-B’s ‘smart’ toothbrush links to smartphone By Hygiene Tribune Staff About 500 attendees at the 2014 ADA annual meeting recently held in San Antonio accepted an open invitation from Crest Oral-B to attend “The Technology Changing Dentistry Reception” that the company scheduled on an evening dur- ing the meeting. After enjoying drinks and appetizers in the Lila Cockrell Theatre at the Henry B. Gonzalez Con- vention Center, attendees listened to presenta- tions from experts connected to two new prod- ucts from Crest Oral-B, one just recently launched and another that will make its debut in January. First ever ‘smart toothbrush’ Sarita Arteaga, DMD, MAGD, associate clini- cal professor at the University of Connecticut School of Dental Medicine and former president of the Hispanic Dental Association Foundation, shared information about the two-way Bluetooth wireless toothbrush technology Crest Oral-B is launching in January. Noting the growing prevalence of smart phone apps for fitness and general health, Arteaga said the new technology essentially links a tooth- brush to a smart phone via an oral-health app. The resulting “smart toothbrush” will make it possible for users to share resulting oral-health information with their dental provider, enabling professional monitoring of such areas as brushing time, pressure and other data that will help users monitor and improve their oral health. In addition to the various data measurements available at launch, it’s expected that a variety of new data-tracking capabilities will be added as consumer use of the smart toothbrush evolves. Strips treat tooth sensitivity for a month Paul Sagel, Procter & Gamble research fellow and inventor of Crest Whitestrips, spoke about the sensitivity treatment product the company re- leased in September, Crest Sensi-Stop Strips. The sensitivity relief strips are designed to pro- vide immediate relief to people suffering sensi- tivity to cold, heat, acids or sweets — providing relief for up to a month. “We have some very exciting innovations that are just now coming on the market or coming to market in the near future,” said Dave Shull, Procter & Gamble associate director. “And we thought this would be a great forum to be able to share new technology with members of ADA.” On stage speaking at an event during the ADA annual meeting in October, Sarita Arteaga, DMD, MAGD, shares information about the two-way Bluetooth tooth- brush technology Crest Oral-B is launching in January. Photo/Robert Selleck, Dental Tribune GNYDM BOOTH NO. 1226 Patricia Walsh, RDH, BS, has been a clinical dental hygienist for more than 20 years. She is a graduate of the Fones School of Dental Hygiene, University of Bridgeport in Connecticut. She has an extensive history in international volunteer work in oral health, including being instrumental in the creation of The Thailand Dental Project, a volunteer program focused on providing educational, preventive and restorative dental care to children in a tsunami-affected region of Thailand. Contact her at pwalshrdh@uberhygienist.com.