FIRST VISIT CHILDREN
Small children often have the “baby teeth” start to erupt into at 6 months of age and generally all twenty of the “baby teeth” will erupt around 24 months. We advise parents to arrange a “first visit” to the dentist at age one. This is to educate the parents on how to care for their child’s teeth, the importance of early hygiene, nutrition, the benefits of fluoride and to arrange a visual clinical examination. The importance of regular examinations (6 months), simple cleaning of the teeth and when additional procedures such as x-ray examination are needed are reviewed. We can help refer you to a pediatric dental practice suitable for your child’s care.
FIRST VISIT ADULTS
The first visit for adolescents and adults is highly variable. For some patients who had difficulties in the past, this may only be a “meet & greet” simple appointment to introduce our practice. In this situation, a very short appointment is arranged to see the office, meet the team members, and merely look at the surroundings. No picking or poking, no touching, no trauma – a chance for all participants to observe each other and choose how to proceed.
For others, we can arrange to do a specific problem focused consultation or a thorough examination with appropriate records and initial discussion of treatment requests.
FINANCIAL POLICY
Our office will make every effort to provide you with the finest care and the most convenient financial options. Our treatment coordinator will work out a plan suited to your individual needs.
For your convenience, we accept Visa, MasterCard, American Express, and Discover. We offer financing through the Care Credit program.
We do not participate with Medicaid based insurance programs and Medicare does not cover restorative dental services. We do not participate with any insurance companies, however, we can work with your out-of-network program (if available) to help you receive insurance reimbursement for covered procedures.
As with all dental practices, by nature of our business, we are an “at risk” profession.
We follow and exceed the guidelines recommended by the CDC, FDA, American and NJ Dental Associations and other organizations with input to current Covid-19 Policy.
- Please wear a mask when entering the building and our office
- Please use hand sanitizer or wash your hands
- We will interview you as per current guidelines before the appointment and at arrival, and take your temperature (forehead, no contact)
- If you arrive very early, please wait in your vehicle and call us
- Current guidelines request that multiple people do not stay in the reception room
- Please come into the office alone unless the patient needs accompaniment by other individuals (driving / transportaion, special needs, anesthesia & sedation treatment, help ambulating and such)
- Accompanying individuals are free to stay in their vehicle, remain outside, or visit nearby establishments for food or drink
For the foreseeable future, we are asking that patients come to appointments alone or accompanied by (1) other person, as recommended by the CDC.
Every patient will be asked to arrive promptly – please do not be late and if you arrive early wait in your car if possible until your appointment time. You will be brought to the treatment room as soon as you register at the front desk.
Please wash your hands and hand sanitize when you arrive. Have a small bottle of water and disposable tissues with you. As recommended, we are performing extra hand washing, gloving, and use of PPE for every patient and before and after treatment. We are doubling our efforts to ensure that our office is extra clean, as everyone’s health is our priority. Treatment rooms, the dental chair, all working surfaces, and door handles are sanitized before and after every treatment. In addition to our regularly scheduled professional office cleaning, we completely spray, and wipe down all surfaces in our office during our hours of operation. We use a hospital operating room, extreme high intensity ultraviolet light (UV-C) unit to kill coronavirus in the air and on ceiling, wall and multiple surfaces in the treatment room. (Few dental offices go to this length to disinfect potential coronavirus aerosol contamination.) Our building and office has placed virus limiting filters in the main HVAC system and office plenum and ducts. We use fresh outside air, not recirculated air.
In order to maintain wellness among our staff and patients, we check staff temperatures every day. We require that any staff member or patient who is not feeling well, remain home. COVID-19 symptoms share symptoms of the flu and other viruses, so it’s not safe to make any assumptions. We are offering flexibility to our cancellation policy in order to ensure that any patient presenting with symptoms can feel comfortable rescheduling.
Thank you for your support in our initiative to keep everyone healthy!
DISCLAIMER
This web site is provided for information and education purposes only. No diagnosis or treatment is being provided. The information contained here should be used in consultation with Dr. Lichtenstein. No guarantees or warranties are made regarding any of the information contained within this web site. This web site is not intended to offer specific medical, dental, or surgical advice to anyone. Further, this web site and Dr. Lee Lichtenstein take no responsibility for web sites hyper-linked to this site and such hyperlinking does not imply any relationships or endorsements of the linked sites.