Are there any special precautions I should take before sending work to a dental lab?
Impressions, prostheses, or appliances should be cleaned and disinfected as soon as possible after removal from the patient’s mouth, before drying of blood or other organic debris. The manufacturer’s instructions regarding the stability of specific materials during disinfection should be consulted. Wet impressions or appliances should be placed in an impervious bag prior to transportation to a commercial dental laboratory. As a precautionary measure, labs should treat all received items as contaminated. Increased caution should be used when handling items that have had direct patient contact. These items must be thoroughly disinfected or sterilized, as appropriate, before proceeding. Labs must clean and disinfect the area for receiving incoming cases immediately after decontamination of each case. Labs must clean and properly disinfect (whenever possible sterilize) items before sending them out, and must package and label to indicate “cleaned”. Please see “Dental Laboratory Asepsis” p. 37 NSDA IPAC 2013.