Australasian Dentist Magazine March April 2021

38 Australasian Dentist product profile Victoria’s lockdowns have made it onerous for people to venture outdoors without good reason. For Dr Sam Verco, Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon and practice owner of Victorian Oral & Facial Surgeons (VO&FS), the restrictions also kept his surgery doors open. “As a specialist practice, we had an obligation to the community, to provide emergency treatment services to patients,” he says. “We’re at the end of the line for a lot of dentists. We had to remain open to help keep patients from going to the hospitals. During that first lockdown, there was concern over PPE supplies and keeping patients out of a hospital environment, as much as possible.” Like any other general practice, VO&FS faced the same risks of infection from aerosol transmission. “In our practice we’ve taken a lot of precautions to help reduce our risks,” he says. “We’ve put HEPA filters in our surgery, the same as in a hospital operating theatre. We wear positive air pressure respirator masks for all of our procedures. We check all of our patients prior to any procedure for COVID, so I believe that we’ve taken a lot of precautions to reduce our risk.” In addition to tightening screening and sterilisation processes, the surgery is also looking to adopt UV-c light, an ultraviolet solution for contamination control and surface treatment, now mostly used in hospitals and sterile environments. Workhorse tools When it came to ensuring safe implant placements, Dr Verco turned to the NSK Surgic Pro. The NSK Surgic Pro is an oral surgery unit designed for demanding clinical environments. Featuring an LED light for high visibility, the fifth generation micromotor delivers up to 80Ncm of torque for diverse surgical procedures. Its compact and lightweight body, powerful torque, high torque accuracy and wide speed range (200 to 40,000min-1) make it ideal for implant and oral surgery. “The NSK Surgic Pro is our work horse,” he says. “We use that for all of our in-house surgical procedures. The practice has two sites, each housing two surgeries. The team currently utilises four of the motors in their local anaesthetic rooms and for all surgical extractions. “We also use them for all of our digital implant placements in our local anaesthetic rooms and in all of our hospital facilities,” Dr Verco adds. “There are four different hospitals that our surgeons operate out of and we’ve got one of the NSK Surgic Pros in each of those locations for our implant placement under general anaesthetic.” Control your aerosols The oral surgeon has been using the NSK Surgic Pro for many years, and has found them durable and reliable. “We use them on a daily basis and we’ve had zero issues from them,” he attests. The reliability of the NSK Surgic Pro now even extends to maintaining a COVID-safe clinical environment – by lowering the aerosol transmission risks between dentists, staff and patients. “We can tailor the amount of irrigation a lot more during a procedure,” he says. “That helps with attaining the right level of irrigation and minimal aerosol generation.” Working relationship that works Dr Verco’s appraisal of the NSK brand and its range of products is backed by a long-standing relationship and a growing toolbox – including an NSK iCare hand piece oiler and autoclave. “We’ve had a good working relationship over the years,” says Dr Verco. “We now have 20 straight hand pieces and 10 angled hand pieces which we’re using regularly. We get them serviced on an as-needs basis. I think over the five years we’ve had to service each of the straight hand pieces probably once to twice. “The angled hand pieces, a lot of them have just worked as new all the way through so we haven’t had to service them during that time.” u NSK Surgic Pro: for safer surgical procedures By Danny Chan