Marcial Guiñez Coelho
Summary
In December 2019, a new outbreak of pneumonia emerged in China, which was identified as SARSCoV-2, which has a rapid spread, being transmitted mainly through cough, sneeze or contact. It has various symptoms such as fever, dry cough and myalgia. It can affect at any age, being mainly mild and with spontaneous resolution, but in older people and/or with comorbidities, it can present a severe or fatal course. For its diagnosis it’s important to evaluate the presence of fever, carry out an epidemiological history, chest CT and laboratory tests such as RT-PCR or samples from the respiratory tract. A qualitative systematic review was performed by searching the Medline and ClinicalKey databases, 72 articles were found, which were read in full, of which 16 met the inclusion and exclusion criteria.Most of the dental actions produce drops or aerosol, for this reason protective measures must be taken, patient selection and types of treatments to decrease the possibility of infections in health personnel and patients, evaluate the use of rubber dam and preoperatorial mouthrinses avoid aerosol-generating instruments, postpone elective care, treat only dental emergencies and take extreme disinfection measures at facilities using effective biocidal agents against coronavirus.The transmission by fomites and aerosols is proven so we must take extreme precautions. In pandemic situations, consideration should be given to providing psychological support to patients, especially with psychosomatic oral pathologies, which may worsen. The possibility of transmission in the recovery period is neither proven nor ruled out.
KEY WORDS: COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2, Coronavirus, Dentistry, Public Health.
How to cite this article
GUIÑEZ, C. M. Impact of COVID-19 worldwide, implications and preventive measures in dental practice and its psychological consequences on patients. Int. J. Odontostomat., 14(3):271-278, 2020.