KANSAS CITY, Mo. — As you head to the dentist, you can expect some new changes before you even step into some offices.
LevelUp Kids, Inc. serves about 5,000 children a year.
The organization provides dental services for low-income children both in Platte and Clay counties.
This month alone, they're on track to see nearly 600 children and expect those numbers to rise as unemployment numbers spike.
For a few weeks in March, all of April and most of May, the office was shut down except for emergencies.
"Parents can call in, and they'd be given the cell phone number of one of the dentists and they'd be able to send pictures to the dentist," Dr. Michelle Butler said.
If the pictures qualified as an emergency under ADA guidelines, they'd treat the emergency in the office.
"The ADA said if there's swelling, extreme pain or a dental infection, that would qualify as an emergency," Butler said.
Now the office is open, and it's been busy.
Some of the changes they've implemented start with a phone call.
"For our patients, we started asking questions over the phone when we call to confirm their appointment," Butler said. "Such as, do they have any symptoms? Have they been around anyone who's been diagnosed with COVID-19? And if they clear our pre-appointment screening, then they can come in."
Families will then text the office when they're in the parking lot.
"Then the front desk can bring them in and take their temperature, as well as taking the temperature of any parent who would like to accompany them," Butler said. "If the parent wants to come in, they'll be given a mask and they can come in and watch their child and see their dental care."
As far as the staff goes, more PPE was required.
"A lot of the stuff we were already doing. We were already wearing the gowns, masks, and gloves," Butler said. "But we do have to wear the N95 masks, so that's been an extra cost that we've had to pay for. We wear face shields as well."
One of the biggest challenges, in the beginning, was getting enough PPE for staff.
"We've been having to search online and making sure that they're FDA approved and they're approved by the CDC as safe enough to protect all of us here," Butler said. "And then we would have to find outside vendors kind of online and make sure they were legitimate vendors and then source our PPE that way, and it was usually double or triple the price of what we were normally paying."
To date, the organization was able to raise enough funds to have all the extra needed equipment for staff.
Air purifiers were also installed in the laboratories to help clean the air when patients and their families come in.
