The Compliance Divas Podcast
Our podcast covers current topics such as infection prevention and control, OSHA and HIPAA compliance for dentistry. We discuss the latest regulatory information, answer frequently asked questions and give suggestions for dental practices to make compliance easy and sustainable. The Compliance Divas are a trusted source for consistent, accurate information based upon current guidelines, standards, science, and recommendations.
The Compliance Divas Podcast
#159 A Game Changing Announcement for Your Practice
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How would you like to know the results of your dental unit waterlines in 15minutes? No more waiting days to find out if the water you are using during patient care is actually safe for patients. Check out the Sterisil FastCheck15 today!
Welcome. I'm Leslie Cannon. I'm Mary Gavoni. I'm Linda Harvey. I'm Olivia Long, and together we are the Compliance Divas.
SPEAKER_02Welcome to the Compliance Divas Podcast. This is Linda Harvey, and I will be your moderator for today's episode. As the Compliance Divas, we bring clarity and simplicity to compliance by navigating the regulatory world to keep you on course. We invite you to subscribe to the podcast through your favorite podcast channel or on our website, thecompliancedevas.com. Any resources that we mentioned in today's podcast can be found on our website, thecompliancedevas.com. And we invite you to submit questions to support at thecompliancedeivas.com. And at the end of today's podcast, we invite you also to scroll down and leave us a review. Today the divas are excited to welcome our newest sustaining partner, Silmetics, and talk about something that is going to be a game changer in the world of waterline testing. I would also like to mention that our divas, Mary Gavoni and Olivia Juan, are unable to attend for us, but they have some important questions that they've given Leslie and I to talk to our special guest, Shonda Chatham. No doubt you are familiar with the family of Sumetex products. They are dentistry's complete provider of water solutions with products and systems to manage your water coming into the practice, through the practice, and out of the practice. So I'd like to welcome our special guest, Shonda Chatham, today. Welcome, Shonda.
SPEAKER_01Thank you. Thank you, Linda. Thank you, Leslie. So excited to be here. Solmetics is a great company. In water in through and out of the practice is our focus. I am the director of marketing for Solmetics. However, my brand specialty is Steracil. That's where I originated from. And as you know, Steracil has been treating dental unit water lines for well over 20 years using silver ion technology, which is great at efficacy and simple when it comes to the number of steps you have to use to treat your water lines. But we have a really special, exciting new innovative test coming out in just a day or so, and we're so excited to share it with you guys.
SPEAKER_02Well, we are thrilled to have you here, Shonda. So tell us more about this new waterline test, please.
SPEAKER_01Absolutely. It is called Fast Check 15, because that's exactly what you can do with it now. You can check your water lines in only 15 minutes, and the results are simple, easy to read. It's new and innovative, like a test strip. So imagine a COVID test strip. You've ever seen one of those, it's got one line or two. This is the exact same thing. Quick and simple, you put it in the vial and you'll see one line or two. One line is um a passing result, and two lines is failed.
SPEAKER_02It can't get any simpler than that with a 15-minute turnaround time. This is just a game changer for our practices.
SPEAKER_01Definitely. Imagine at the end of the day, you could take that test after your last patient, check your water lines any day of the week because there's nothing to mail in. There's no time that you have to wait in between to get results. And if you were to fail the test, you could shock overnight and have be up and running before your next patient sits in that chair.
SPEAKER_02What a beautiful solution. Because I know as a consultant, when I go on site, I'm hesitant to conduct the water testing because I won't be there in three days to help them read the results. And while they can text me a picture, it's just not the same thing and trying to help troubleshoot. And if I perform a test and take the test with me home and I and they fail, then I'm trying to teach them from afar. So this is perfect because we can even conduct a test during our trainings to make it more effective and really showcase how to handle this properly and do a good test. This is great information. I'm so excited about it. Well, our Deva Leslie has some questions for you, Shonda, on behalf of Mary and Olivia.
SPEAKER_00Shonda, we noticed that focusing on dental unit water lines is not entirely new. Yet some of our listeners may be new to dentistry. So can you tell us why there's an issue or concern with dental unit water lines?
SPEAKER_01Yes. Unfortunately, in 2015 in Georgia and 2016 in California, there were some significant outbreaks in dental practices because of water lines. Water lines can harbor bacteria and most prominently something called biofilm, which is this icky sludge that likes to stick on the inside of those little tiny water lines and protect that bacteria inside. When those lines are not treated really well, unfortunately, that water goes downstream to the patient during a procedure and it can make them very sick.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's a great explanation. And when you mentioned uh the outbreaks in Georgia and California, that's pretty serious business there. I understand in 2015 there were several children who were uh infected with uh mycobacterium epsepsis as a result of the non-tubercular microbacterium in the dental unit water. And then the following year, right here in California, my home state, we had a huge outbreak where 73 children were affected by dental unit water. 72 of them were hospitalized with very serious illness. So, in light of that, testing dental unit water would be something that should be mandatory. While it's not, it is something that CDC recommends. And a reasonable and responsible dental practice would follow CDC guidelines. Wouldn't you agree? I absolutely agree.
SPEAKER_01Unfortunately, there is a lot of confusion in the industry. You have to meet the EPA drinking water standard, which is 500 CFU or less bacteria count. However, there are not any specifics out there that say you must test your water lines, except in the state of Washington. But in others, they do not have a specific requirement. So right now we follow the guidelines that OSAP has in their white papers, which is to test consecutively every month until you get two passing results, and then every quarter with an R2A test, which gives you it's a more mail-in test. It gives you a more finite um count of your CFU, your pH, and your TDS, all things that contribute to your waterline health.
SPEAKER_00Well, that's amazing that we can count on something once a month to test our water. And if I understand you right, if we have two consecutive passes, then we could move to quarterly. It can't be any simpler than that. And with your test kit being at 15 minutes, that certainly does give us um a big jump on other test kits that take days or you know, sometimes 24 hours to 72 hours. Now, on a different vein, let's talk about the dental practices that use different products to maintain their water and then shock their water lines. Are there any issues with using one brand for maintenance of water in dental unit waterline bottles and a different brand for shocking?
SPEAKER_01There is a difference. Um, sterile has all the products. We have treatment products, we have testing products, and we have shocking products. They are all designed to work together using silver ion technology. So, for example, if you were using the stero cell straw, also known as the stere straw, as your treatment method, when you shock the system, you will and use you use citrusil shock. You do not need to remove the sterocil straw. They work together, which is very unique. With other types of straws, you would have to remove the straw and insert what's called a dummy straw in order to shock. Well, great.
SPEAKER_00That is a great explanation, and I'm glad to know that uh you all the products work together. And also to remind our listeners that if they are using products that are not the same, they would have to go through that extra step of taking off a stereo straw and putting a dummy straw on in order to do their shock treatment. Linda, back to you.
SPEAKER_02Thank you, Leslie. That is some great information, Shonda. Thank you so much. I'm so glad that you both discussed the situations that happened with the disease transmission in Georgia and California, because my understanding that I'm more familiar with the California case because the Georgia one was smaller, is that those lawsuits, those class action lawsuits, are still ensuing. So besides the fact we want to maintain high levels of patient safety in our practice and do the right thing and have quality care, when that falls or falters, then the practice is has a liability. And so this is what's happened. So it's important that everybody coming into dentistry be aware of these types of responsibilities and carrying out patient safety duties, if you will, Shonda, you know, throughout the day. So I think this is a really important piece. And I love the fact that you can test that day, get the results that day. And if you need to shock, you can do it that day as well. Because that's been a frustrating thing with our clients, especially the many dental practices that are closed on Fridays. You know, you can't test on a Thursday. Maybe you can't even test on a Wednesday. So it really narrows it down to the days that you can test. And those sometimes are the busiest days of the week. Monday can be hectic with uh maybe the patients calling with a toothache over the weekend or something along those lines. So it really puts a lot of stress on our teams to be compliant. And now it can be so easy that it can be delegated to everybody on the clinical team. It doesn't have to be the one lone dental assistant who's testing all the rooms because now it's so easily done. And that's what I think is going to take. Um, we're gonna demystify this. It's gonna be easy, easy peasy, as the saying goes. So, Shonda, I have another question for you from uh Diva Olivia, and that is if an office is maintaining, they're doing it in water lines with the straw or tablets and shocking regularly according to the manufacturer's instructions for use. So is testing really necessary then?
SPEAKER_01Because if you already follow all these directions, absolutely, it is necessary because that is the only way to know is if you test your water. We can put the best water into the dental unit bottle and have great treatment. But unfortunately, as soon as they get in those little water lines where biofilm loves to live, bacteria can duplicate every four to 20 minutes and it can get out of control really quickly. The water lines are the problem. It's not just your water, it's your water lines as well. So making sure that your treatment is working well and that your water lines hopefully are cleaned out and we can try to mitigate as much biofilm as we can. This is why testing is so important. It is the only way to know. And I'll I'll say a quick quote from someone very prominent in the industry, it's Nancy Dewhurst. We are not in the business of not knowing. We need to know. And it's a very simple, easy way to know. Passing results are fantastic as well because now you know that you are doing the right thing, your treatment is working, and you can continue that patient workflow without any interruption.
SPEAKER_02Shandra, can we get can we take that a step further if you don't mind? And talking about the need for shocking. Um, can you talk about the water bottles? Do they need to be cleaned very often? Or and I know there's different types of water bottles.
SPEAKER_01Yes, it's a good question. There are different types of water bottles. Stercil does have the only antimicrobial bottle that's impregnated with silver, which helps keep biofilm from collecting on the inside of that bottle. So typically we tell people to shock their water bottles, which is also used to clean the inside once a month or once a quarter, depending on what types of bottles that you do have. Right now, Sterocil has adopted a new sterosil safe water testing protocol, which is taking a proactive approach to your dental unit waterline health. And that will combine testing and shocking monthly, regardless of whether you pass or fail. So you can stay ahead of biofilm and make sure you keep things mitigated and not wonder when should I shock? Why should I shock? How should I shock? We do it all at once with a quick 15-minute test and a quick overnight shock.
SPEAKER_02That makes it so much easier to put into the workflow, and you don't have to remember what part of a quarter. And you can put it on the checklist that you have, whether you have digital checklists or paper checklists. So then as new team members come in, everybody can be acclimated to what needs to be done at each operatory. And I feel like they can decentralize it, as I mentioned a minute ago, and each team member can pretty much have responsibility for their own treatment rooms.
SPEAKER_01I totally agree with you. It makes it so simple. Anyone in the practice can conduct the test very easily. And with citrusil shock, it's putting one tablet into the bottle. No liquids, um, nothing else to mix. It's a simple tablet's very, very, very cost effective as well. So why not be proactive about your waterline health rather than always being reactive to it?
SPEAKER_02Well, as a risk manager, I think being proactive is is ideal. And I think being it just puts us into a better position because we know. And it also puts in a position where we have something that I call defensible documentation. So that way, if there's ever an allegation that a patient claims they contracted a disease or an infection or their implant failed, and of course, in an implant case, you would be using sterile water, obviously, but any other dental treatment, you know, something with disease was transmitted during dental care, you're going to come down to where the instrument's sterile. And what about the bordlines? So I think those would be two really big pieces right there. And having that documentation just puts everybody at ease. And this certainly sounds like it's super easy to carry out. Um Shonda, could you talk to us a little bit about the difference in the test? I know that the the mail out, the mailback water tests or have different sensitivity because those are conducted in labs. And then that the paddle test, you know. Um, I don't know if most of our listeners understand that or maybe know about what makes the paddle test work and then what makes the test strip work. What's the difference in those? Perhaps a little bit of science background here.
SPEAKER_01Certainly. Certainly. Well, let's just start really quick with the R2A, which is the standard, the gold standard in the industry. It's been around for a long time. It's a lab test. So it requires you to take the samples, put them in with ice packs, and mail them overnight to a dental lab that can run the tests. And they that is a heterotropic flake count method, which is recommended by OSAP, CDC guidelines, ADA guidelines as well. That's going to give you a specific CFU count by allowing the bacteria to incubate over a period of time. It's up to five days. It gives you a really nice clean count. Also, it tells you what kind of pH is in your water because pH balance in water can allow bacteria to grow in different ways. And also your TDS, which is total dissolved solids, also affects how your water is treated. So that one is a it's a great method, and everyone should still continue to use that because you have hard documentation with a hard CFU count that you can keep with your records. But the challenge of that is mailing it in. So if you take the test on a Monday, um, actually you have to take it Monday, Tuesday, or even Wednesday because some of the labs are not open after Friday and they don't open on the weekends. You want to make sure your samples arrive still cold, nicely kept, um, so they can be processed. And that can be a challenge for a practice to try to do that on a specific time frame. Then when you come in to take a look at paddles, paddles are great, they're also a heterotropic plate count method. So they will incubate for three days, so a little bit less time, and they're an in-office test. So they're simple. You can you dip them in the water and you set them aside so they can incubate that bacteria. The challenge of those is reading the bacteria. There's some small squares that you have to sort of look at the different dot counts and see if it's more or less than the area that's recommended to tell you whether you're over your 500 CFU limit. Um, and then there's also a vial test that's out there that has a color changing attribute to let you know where your CFU count may lie. The challenge with that is those who are colorblind or have color acuity issues have trouble differentiating between is this a darker pink or blue or is this purple? So it's a little bit subjective. With a fast check test and having a strip, it's a one-line or two. Very simple. It eliminates all subjectivity. So there isn't any um someone looking at counting dots or or the spread on something, um, and there's no color. It's very simple. Pass or fail. Cannot be missed.
SPEAKER_02I know it just makes life easy, easy, easy, easy. And I can identify with with the dots on the paddles because it is hard to read sometimes and it's subjective as to how many are really there. Is it really less than 200? Should we call it more than 200? What's the best, which way should we air to be on the safe side? So again, it takes out the subjectivity, especially for team members that are doing the tests that maybe don't have as much experience as someone else in dentistry and they're not quite sure. So overall, this is a game changer for dentistry. And I think the fact that we can streamline deal to waterline testing and improve our protocols, we finally have a system that will put it all together in one piece for us. Leslie, what thoughts do you have?
SPEAKER_00Well, during this podcast, I took an opportunity to open up the sample pack of Fast Check 15, and it was just three simple items that you needed to draw your water, put it into a vial, and then put that test strip in. And I looked at the QR code. I just love QR codes because I can pull up information right on my phone. And the steps are super simple to take. So again, even though you said it was, I believe you now. Seeing is believing. And um I can't wait to test water in my own uh my own house here. I'd like to test my refrigerator line water and see how many if we're within normal limits or if we're over. And I bet we're probably over due to the how we've uh found the other water lines and other types of businesses, homes and and uh like uh beverage machines, and they've always tested them to be very highly colonized with bacteria. So in any case, I was so thrilled that this is definitely an easy, fast way to get some results.
SPEAKER_01I couldn't agree more. It is, we will be testing water in in various places, which I'm not sure we want to know, but we probably should know. Um, it is a fast check 15 is fantastic. You you do literally place five drops in the vial. There's a little reagent that you'll notice in the vial. You swirl it around, let it sit for five minutes, give it another swirl, put the test strip in, let it sit for 10 minutes, and you can read results. It's as simple as that.
SPEAKER_02It doesn't get any simpler. So I'd like to, Leslie, to your point about waterlines in different areas, whether it's our refrigerator or ice machines in the restaurant or wherever, I read an article, probably it might have been published by the American Hospital Association about a hospital that was having some outbreaks and they traced it back to their ice machine. Patients were getting sick and back infected from the ice machine. So interesting to know that. Let's circle back on that because in with the paddle test, our clients could pool water, you know, take a little bit of from, you know, all three lines in a room, both air water syringes and say the high-speed handpiece or the ultrasonic scalar, and have a pooled sample. Now I know there's pros and cons to that, but that's just one option. So with the five drops, do you all recommend just testing each line separately now?
SPEAKER_01With the five drops, you can still do a pooled sample from the same operatory unit, so long as it's the same water source. And what you would do is you collect the water, it's part of our IFU, collect the water in a clean cup, and then you draw with the little pipette that comes with the test kit your water out and drop the five drops into the vial. So you can still test that way, or if you prefer to test one line. But the preference is probably to do a pooled sample within the same unit because you want to make sure you don't test one. The lines that might pass, and then you might have a couple that do not, because they're all separate lines if you really think about them that way. So I think pulling them together within the same unit is the best option to get a good sample. Plus, what right afterwards, we're recommending that you shock again, pass or fail. So that way you're always being proactive, and you're going to shock all of this the lines at once anyway.
SPEAKER_02That makes it very clear. Thank you. I wasn't sure. And so they could simply use the patient cup to gather some water and they maybe equal amount from each of the uh lines and then swirl it around so it kind of gets mixed, or they can choose to do separately if they wanted.
SPEAKER_01Correct. And it's important to note that you don't need a germicidal neutralizer. So we have treatment running in the in the lines, right? And it's killing bacteria. Some products do have to have a germicidal neutralizer to stop that process so that when you take the test, you're actually getting real counts and that the water doesn't continue to kill the bacteria in it. So you don't get good counts from it. This test is so fast that you don't need to have a germicidal neutralizer, and it makes things a lot simpler.
SPEAKER_02Amazing. Everything during this entire podcast has been amazing. So I hope that our listeners have taken back some good information and are sitting on the edge of their seats waiting to place their orders for these tests. So get ready, Shonda, because I think you're going to have a lot of orders coming in. It's going to be wonderful. So today we learned about the new stereo cell 15-minute water test called the Fast Check 15. Doesn't get any simpler than getting the results of your waterline testing within 15 minutes. Shonda gave us some great information about how you can test, shock, and retreat on the same day. So you can be up and running with the next day when you come in to work versus having to wait over the weekend or having downtime on a room. Because previously, Shonda, you know, we were all advising our clients to close the room down if it if it failed. And then you'd have to wait maybe 24 hours or three three days to get the next results back. And then you, you know, shock again. Um, so it's it's challenging. I did have one quick dental assistant that said to me, No, we won't shut the room down, we just won't use the water. We can do, we can do a limited exam or we could do a post-op check here. We don't need water, we could still use the chair. She was nervous about losing that chair. So I thought that was quick thinking. But but to her point, you know, you really can't do anything in the room. I mean, ethically, I think when the water, you the water is not passed, you really shouldn't be using it on treatment.
SPEAKER_01I agree, I agree. It is it is a challenge, right? You have patients that are coming in, um, and and it's really difficult. You don't want to have to shut the operatory down and and call your patients and reschedule time for them to come back. Some people are already nervous about coming to the dentist, and to have them reschedule around busy schedules is very difficult. So, with this method, you can test right after your last patient. And like I said, get the shock in if you need it, shock and be up and running and never miss a beat with your patients, which is really convenient for them as well. Keeps the practice flowing and it keeps everything nice and safe.
SPEAKER_02Safety is what it's all about. So I would invite our listeners that as soon as this podcast is over, to ring up your dental sales rep and place your order for this new Fast Check 15 test. Shonda, thank you for joining us today. It's been great having you. We're excited about this launch and so excited that the Divas can be part of it.
SPEAKER_01We are excited as well. You know, we're all here for the right reasons. We're all here to make sure that every patient has a safe visit. And we really do believe Fast Check 15 is changing the game and making it much simpler for the dental assistants who work really, really hard. Everyone in the practice has a lot to think about. And if we can make it a little simpler and a little easier and more affordable, Sterisol is all about it.
SPEAKER_02So glad to hear that. That's why our partnership is so wonderful. Thank you for joining us today, Shonda. Thank you for having me. As a compliance divas, we bring clarity and simplicity to compliance by navigating the regulatory world to keep you on course. We invite you to subscribe to our podcast through your favorite podcast channel or on our website, thecompliancedeevas.com. Any resources that we mentioned today will be found in the show notes. We invite you to submit questions to support at thecompliancedivas.com. And don't forget to scroll down and leave us a review at the end of the podcast. And don't forget to connect with your dental sales rep to check out this brand new product. And we will see you next time.