How to Find Us

Amsel & Wilkins

We are used to maintaining a high level of cleanliness and sterilisation on a routine basis to ensure your safety during your visits to the practice, having chosen at its introduction to aim to work to best practice as set out in the government guidelines set out in HTM1-05 some years ago. To this end, all members of the team are trained in cross-infection procedures and we have a dedicated sterilisation coordinator.

We are now wearing masks full time in addition to the gloves, aprons and visors you may have noticed if you have visited us since we re-opened in June. This is to protect both you and us from passing infection on.

We have introduced a £3 PPE1 charge to cover this level of protection which applies to all routine appointments

When we carry out any procedure that might create an aerosol (AGP= aerosol-generating procedure), such as a filling, we now don full-length washable gowns and a higher level of mask in addition to the gloves and visors.

We have also invested in HEPA filters for each surgery to continuously filter the air and decontaminate it by drawing air through filters and then exposing it to UV light.

After each AGP procedure, we then leave the surgery for up to one hour to allow any vapour droplets to settle before re-entering to wipe down all surfaces and mop the floor with disinfectant. Fortunately, we have spare surgery capacity to be able to go and carry out simple procedures during this "fallow time" which has allowed us to minimise our lost working time.

We have introduced a £8.50 PPE2 charge to cover this higher level of protection which applies to all such appointments. Some practices have had to introduce significant higher charges as they do not have spare surgeries to use during the fallow time.

What is HTM1-05?

This is the guide set out by Public Health England and the CQC to deliver best practice in preventing cross-infection. There are several levels and we have always strived to maintain the best practice level.

We pay for an independent assessor to carry out regular inspections of our practice and review our policies and procedures to ensure that we are compliant and consistently working to the best standard of the guidelines. We comfortably passed the CQC inspection that was carried out previously.

We have a separate sterilisation room on each floor of the practice equipped with washer-disinfectors and vacuum autoclaves to pre-clean all instruments and then sterilise them. Not all practices have invested in this level of equipment. Daily checks are made and recorded to ensure these machines are working efficiently and a regular maintenance schedule is adhered to.

Where instruments cannot be sterilised (such as root canal files) they are used once and disposed of in suitable containers and taken for safe disposal by specialist contractors. We pay for this disposal service to be done properly.