Department of Building Science, School of Architecture, Tsinghua University, Beijing 100084, People's Republic of China.
J R Soc Interface. 2010 Jul 6;7(48):1105-18. doi: 10.1098/rsif.2009.0516. Epub 2009 Dec 23.
Dental healthcare workers (DHCWs) are at high risk of occupational exposure to droplets and aerosol particles emitted from patients' mouths during treatment. We evaluated the effectiveness of an air cleaner in reducing droplet and aerosol contamination by positioning the device in four different locations in an actual dental clinic. We applied computational fluid dynamics (CFD) methods to solve the governing equations of airflow, energy and dispersion of different-sized airborne droplets/aerosol particles. In a dental clinic, we measured the supply air velocity and temperature of the ventilation system, the airflow rate and the particle removal efficiency of the air cleaner to determine the boundary conditions for the CFD simulations. Our results indicate that use of an air cleaner in a dental clinic may be an effective method for reducing DHCWs' exposure to airborne droplets and aerosol particles. Further, we found that the probability of droplet/aerosol particle removal and the direction of airflow from the cleaner are both important control measures for droplet and aerosol contamination in a dental clinic. Thus, the distance between the air cleaner and droplet/aerosol particle source as well as the relative location of the air cleaner to both the source and the DHCW are important considerations for reducing DHCWs' exposure to droplets/aerosol particles emitted from the patient's mouth during treatments.
牙科医护人员（DHCWs）在治疗过程中，有很高的职业暴露于患者口腔飞沫和气溶胶颗粒的风险。我们评估了空气净化器在减少飞沫和气溶胶污染方面的有效性，将该设备放置在实际牙科诊所的四个不同位置。我们应用计算流体动力学（CFD）方法来求解气流、不同大小的空气传播飞沫/气溶胶颗粒的能量和弥散的控制方程。在牙科诊所中，我们测量了通风系统的送风速度和温度、空气净化器的气流率和粒子去除效率，以确定 CFD 模拟的边界条件。我们的结果表明，在牙科诊所使用空气净化器可能是减少 DHCWs 暴露于空气传播飞沫和气溶胶颗粒的有效方法。此外，我们发现空气净化器的空气去除率和气流方向对于控制诊所中的飞沫和气溶胶污染都是重要的控制措施。因此，空气净化器与飞沫/气溶胶颗粒源之间的距离以及空气净化器相对于源和 DHCW 的相对位置，都是在治疗过程中减少 DHCWs 暴露于患者口腔喷出的飞沫/气溶胶颗粒的重要考虑因素。
