The Galveston County (Texas) Health Department found Coastal Health & Wellness Clinic — which has dental offices in Texas City and Galveston — used unsanitary sterilization practices that may have caused approximately 9,500 former patients to contract Hepatitis B, Hepatitis C and/or HIV, according to a KHOU report.
The state's health department audit showed 11 different life-threatening violations related to clinic staff failing to clean or sterilize instruments used during dental procedures. The main concerns are for patients who underwent invasive procedures, who may have been exposed to Hepatitis B or Hepatitis C and HIV.
Coastal Health & Wellness Executive Director Mary McClure and Governing Board Chair Milton Howard, DDS, held a press conference March 26 to respond to the audit. "Patient safety and employee safety are most important to us," Ms. McClure said. "We have trained staff on sterilization equipment."
Patients seen from March 2015 to February 2017 are at risk. The Coastal Health & Wellness website red flagged 72 procedures, including stitches and tooth extractions, according to KHOU.
Although Coastal Health & Wellness stopped taking patients in February, the patients were not told why, Ms. McClure said. "We told them, when we were canceling their appointments, that we were doing some redesigns internally with our processes," she said. No one has been fired to date.
Testing services for patients who were potentially exposed to these diseases are underway.