Oral surgery during COVID-19 in Iraq: Health protocols, dental treatment and cross infection

Background with Aim of the Study COVID-19 poses a challenge for oral surgeons, which requires important changes to avoid unnecessary risks of infection to the surgical team and patients. The study aimed to assess the impact of COVID-19 on dental treatment and the risk of cross-infection. Methods A cross-sectional descriptive study was conducted using online questionnaires specially prepared by Google Forms targeting dentists and their patients. The collected data were transferred to Excel sheets, and SPSS version 24 was used to analyze the data. Descriptive and Chi-Square Tests were used to analyze the data. (p ≤ 0.05, considered statistically significant). Results A total of 1434 subjects participated in this study: 154 dentists and 1280 patients. About 35.1% of dentists were infected with covid-19, and only 44.4% of them were infected during work. While 25.2% of the patients were infected with covid-19, and only 1.7% of them got infected after visiting a dentist. There was no statistically significant relationship between infection with Covid-19 and visits to dentists. Conclusion Adhering to the dentist’s personal protection methods has major effect on reducing transmission of infection from the dentist to the patient and vice versa and may even prevent infection.