Protect Yourself & Your Family

Healthcare settings present major challenges in achieving effective infection protection for you, the patient — especially from the transmission of airborne illnesses. Think about it: Sick people see doctors, and congregate in waiting rooms. Not everyone wears an effective mask these days. Not everyone knows that he or she is infected with an illness. In dental settings, common procedures (such as drilling and cleaning) produce large and small particles that consist of human biological material, and travel short and long distance, sometimes remaining suspended and viable for hours in the ambient air that surrounds you. And worldwide, billions of cases of respiratory illnesses occur each year, including COVID-19, RSV, and influenza. Here in the United States, tuberculosis has recently re-emerged; and tuberculosis is airborne transmissible.

Healthy Buildings

Practically speaking, it is understandable that an office or facility cannot wipe down and disinfect each and every surface in the room that you are sitting. The provider wearing a mask helps protect you from any airborne transmissible respiratory illness that the provider may have, but not from prior patients or others around you. You may not be able to wear a surgical mask at all times during your exam or procedure; after all, we, as humans, have to breathe.

Most buildings were not designed to open windows to increase ventilation and most HVAC systems were designed with a focus on heating and cooling a room – and keeping you comfortable, not remediating the air that you are breathing from infectious particles – and keeping you safe. Next time you go into an exam room, look how far away the return air ducts are from you. That’s a long distance and a huge volume of air in between. And some of the gimmick devices that emerged during the COVID-19 pandemic? Do they really work? We will leave that answer to science and experience.

There is no silver bullet, and both OSHA and the CDC recognize the need to take a “layered” approach, one which includes “improving ventilation [as] a key engineering control.” That’s exactly what we do: We add a crucial layer to improve room ventilation and protect you.

  • Respiratory infections may be the most common reason for doctor visits.
  • Upper and lower respiratory tracts can be involved.
  • Upper respiratory infections are the most common illness resulting in missed work or school.
  • The majority of upper respiratory infections are caused by viruses, like influenza RSV, Covid-19, and tuberculosis.
  • Respiratory infections may be the most common reason for doctor visits.
  • Upper and lower respiratory tracts can be involved.

    Respiratory illnesses (like COVID-19, NSV, and influenza), for example, are spread in three ways, through contact, droplet, and airborne transmission (through inhalation).

    We can all keep our hands clean. We can cover our mouth and nose when we cough and sneeze. We can social distance. We can take vaccines, but as we are now seeing, they may not protect against infection, but we as humans must breathe. We cannot wear an effective mask 24/7, especially through an examination or procedure that involves the human respiratory tract.

    Consider This:

    • A person emits anywhere between 900 to 300,000 liquid particles 1  from their mouth simply by coughing, talking or breathing.
    • Emitted particles are biological in nature,  ranging in size from microscopic – a thousandth the width of a hair – up to the size of a grain of fine beach sand.
    • Particle size, shape and weight and ambient air currents affect how long they will stay aloft in the air.
    • Particles containing the virus can travel more than 6 feet, especially indoors and in dry conditions with relative humidity below 40%.
    • Under certain conditions, infectious particles can remain aloft for hours and capable of infecting a person who breathes in any of these particles.
    • Contact transmission occurs through self inoculation (by touch) of a mucus membrane in the nose, mouth, or eyes after direct contact with an infectious person (e.g., touching during a handshake), or with an article or surface that has become contaminated. The latter is sometimes referred to as “fomite transmission.”
    • Droplet transmission occurs through exposure of a mucus membrane in the nose, mouth, or eyes after to virus-containing respiratory droplets (i.e., larger and smaller droplets and particles) emitted by an infectious person. Transmission is most likely to occur when someone is close to the infectious person, generally within about 6 feet according to the CDC.
    • Airborne transmission occurs through exposure to small virus-containing respiratory droplets or droplet nuclei that can remain suspended in the air for long time periods and travel long distances away from the emitter. Infection control procedures require knowledge of how viruses are spread from person to person.

    Ask any infection control expert, and they will tell you airborne transmission is the hardest to protect against and for most, the least understood.


    Our solution to the problem of keeping you safe from airborne transmission of illnesses, focuses on containing and cleaning the air that surrounds you, that you breathe, during your examination or procedure. We focus on potential sources of airborne transmissible disease, and have developed technology that addresses keeping the genie from escaping from the bottle. A cough can send particles traveling at speeds up to 60 mph.

    By simply being near other people, you are coming into constant contact with aerosols from their mouth.

    CDC in its revised COVID-19 guidance has caught up to us, and now recommends medical and dental practitioners focus on source control. We designed our pre/Vent AER System to be affordable, and safe and simple to use. It uses only AER: Aerating, Evacuating and Remediating the air that surrounds you and you breathe. Much like opening a window. It transcends the current COVID-19 pandemic, protecting you now and into the next pandemic or season.

    Look for the sticker on the door that says, We CAERE.

    You will know that your medical or dental provider has selected the #1SourceControl product to keep you safe during your visit.