Scotland’s largest dental group has been able to successfully start welcoming back patients for routine check-ups and treatments across all of its 40 practices.
Clyde Munro’s practices, most of which have been open for emergency treatments since 22nd June when they were given the go ahead, have now resumed routine patient examinations after four months, following the recent announcement from Scotland’s Chief Dental Officer.
Staff have already started working through the backlog of patient appointments which were
cancelled or postponed since lockdown began.
Dr Jacqui Frederick, Group Clinical Director at Clyde Munro said: “As a group,
we’ve been able to share knowledge, advice and protocols to enable us to safely
open all of our practices to some non-emergency treatment.
“Our respective teams across Scotland have been waiting for this moment for
months and are delighted to have patients back through the door. Every practice
has had extensive social distancing and hygiene procedures put in place
throughout.
“In the month since we were able to resume emergency treatments in NHS
practices, we have refined all of those procedures. Now our entire workforce are
extremely comfortable in how to make the process as simple and easy as possible
for patients, while keeping them safe.”
However, Dr Frederick urged patients to avoid calling practices to request a
check-up or routine appointment. While continuing to treat emergency cases,
the next priority is to rearrange those routine appointments originally scheduled
between March and July, which were cancelled due to lockdown.
She added: “We understand we have many patients throughout the country who
are very keen to resume their care, but we’d ask them to please bear with us. Our
first priority is to get in touch with all patients whose appointments were
cancelled.
“We want to assure all of our patients that we will get to them for their routine
check-ups as quickly as possible and that they will be able to get treatment if
they have urgent dental problems.
“It’s also important for us to make patients aware that when they do arrive at the
practice, it will be very different from what they have experienced during their
previous visits.”
The team worked to ensure that every practice was ready to reopen on day one in June for
emergency treatments.
Those attending the practice are asked to observe a wide range of safety
procedures which include, filling in forms digitally before attending, using on site
sanitising stations, observing strict social distancing, following a one-way system
and paying by contactless methods where possible.
Clyde Munro was founded by Jim Hall in 2015 with the acquisition of seven practices. Since then, it has enjoyed rapid growth through acquisition and has plans to continue expanding.
It now comprises 40 practices across Scotland, with more than 200 dentists, 350 staff and 300,000 patients. The group’s ambition is to become Scotland’s “local dentist”, operating an expanding network of family dentists across Scotland, with each devoted to providing the best dental care, while reflecting the needs and character of its community.
