Authored by Gabriela Malateaux*
Abstract
The new coronavirus (COVID-19) quickly became a pandemic. Its transmission occurs mainly by direct contact, but its indirect transmission cannot be neglected. The dental office becomes a place of a high risk of contamination, mainly through aerosols and particles decanted on the surface. Concern about biosafety has become imminent and essential supplies of personal protection have become scarce. Several methods of disinfecting protective materials, the environment, and surfaces are being studied to reduce cross-infection, such as ultraviolet (UV) light. Our objective was to conduct a review of the recent literature in order to elucidate the use of UV technology in disinfecting environments and surfaces to reduce crosscontamination of COVID-19 in the health area, and how it can be used in the dental area. The PubMed database was used, and the articles were selected according to their relevance between 2018 and 2020. It is concluded that decontamination in environments and surfaces is effective, while the use of UV in PPE seems to be possible but deserves attention. It is suggested to carry out further studies aimed at disinfection by UV light in the dental area so that it can be used safely and effectively.
Keywords: UV disinfection; UV disinfection and COVID-19; UV disinfection; Dentistry
Introduction
The beginning of the epidemic disease caused by the new coronavirus (COVID-19) was notified in December 2019. On January 30, 2020, World Health Organization (WHO) announced that this would be an emergency outbreak of public health and international interest. In early march, COVID-19 was detected in many countries and was therefore compatible with a pandemic [1-8].
The transmission of the new coronavirus occurs mainly through direct means, through coughing, sneezing, and inhalation of droplets present in the air, however, it can also occur through indirect means, through contact with contaminated mucous membranes, hands, objects, and surfaces [2-4, 9-15]. Therefore, the dental office is a place of a high risk of contamination, mainly through aerosols suspended in the air and decanted on surfaces [16]. As the pandemic progressed, concerns about the biosafety of health professionals and prevention of cross-infection increased, as did concerns about the worldwide shortage of critical personal protective supplies and protective equipment (PPE) [1,2,17-19]. The PPE most used by these professionals are gloves, long-sleeved aprons, glasses, surgical masks, visors, and respiratory masks of the type n95 or PFF2 [1, 2, 17, 20-23], all of which are manufactured for single use [1].
Due to the increase in the number of cases and the difficulty in maintaining basic supplies of individual protection for health professionals, it was started to think about ways to reuse them. Most conventional sterilization technologies used in hospitals or dental offices cannot effectively reprocess PPE due to the nature of their modalities, which will damage them [1]. Given that coronavirus and other respiratory viruses are significantly less resistant to sterilization modalities, the use of high to moderate level disinfection is sufficient to meet the needs of PPE reprocessing, and ultraviolet C (UV-C) irradiation can be effective for this purpose [1,24,25].
UV-C is proven to reduce bacterial and viral contamination in several health services, addressing the disinfection of air, water, and surfaces [26-29]. In this sense, the question is: will this technology help us to control infections at the dental office level? Can we use it to disinfect objects and PPE? This article aims to review the literature in order to elucidate the use of technologies based on UV-C for disinfecting surfaces and environments in different fields in the health area, and how these can be inserted in the routine of the dental office. , aiming to decrease the risk of cross-infection by COVID-19.
Materials and Methods
Identify the research question
Can ultraviolet (UV) light be used to disinfect contaminated environments and surfaces in the health area? How can we insert it into the routine within the dental office, aiming at reducing the risk of cross-infection by COVID-19?
Data collection and identification
Systematic searches were performed through the identification of descriptors and the use of the Boolean operator (AND). The following descriptors were used: UV disinfection, UV disinfection and COVID-19, UV disinfection and dentistry
1) The year of publications was defined, from 2018 to 2020, as well as the English language.
2) The research was carried out in April 2020, in the PubMed database.
3) The articles were selected after a thorough analysis of their abstracts.
Selection of studies
The studies first selected were those that contained subjects related to UV disinfection in health care fields, their abstracts were carefully read and in a second selection, only research related to the dental field or that could be referred to dentistry were chosen.
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