Fighting the 2019 Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19) as One NDCS Family

It has been three months since Singapore reported her first case of COVID-19. How have we been managing as a Centre?

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Enhanced screening measures at the lobby, prudent use of PPE and team segregation. These were but some of the measures that have been implemented by the NDCS COVID-19 taskforce and Infection Prevention and Control team since the DORSCON level was raised to orange in February.

Since then, everyone in the Centre has had to get used to routines that have gradually became our new normal. Our colleagues from the Operations department - Frontline and Call-Centre have had to reschedule appointments for patients with recent travel history overseas and/or who display respiratory symptoms. Non-urgent or non-essential treatments have also been rescheduled.

Our triage team at level one ensures that only one accompanying person is allowed for each patient arriving at NDCS. Clinicians and Dental Surgery Assistants (DSAs) have to verify the patient's travel history prior to treatment. Staff in patient-fronting areas are required to don masks at all times and practice good hand hygiene. In addition, teams have been deployed to support the nationwide effort to fight COVID-19, supporting in areas such as taking throad swabs and conducting fever screening, as well as in operations and administration.

Keeping NDCS safe for us and our patients requires a concerted effort from all of us. When done right, these safe distancing measures can help keep our loved ones at home safe as well.

Let us remain united and support one another in our fight against COVID-19. We got this!