PETERSON AIR FORCE BASE, Colo. -- A new, state-of-the-art dental clinic opens Oct. 30, at Peterson Air Force Base. The clinic, located on Pete East, is focused on providing cost-effective treatment alongside the Department of Defense’s largest Area Dental Laboratory. The clinic replaces a temporary clinic that has been in use for the past decade.
Within its 16,000 square feet, the new dental clinic contains 19 dental treatment rooms, an oral surgery suite and laboratory space with in-lab computer-assisted design technology which allows staff to rush the creation of dental prostheses, providing a quicker return-to-duty for warfighters.
The facility design allows for economy-of-motion between the providers, staff and patients allowing for more beneficial patient care. Each of the dental treatment rooms are designed to allow right- and left-handed providers to deliver care. Previously, a left-handed dentist would only be able to operate in a treatment room designed for the left-handed and vice versa.
All treatment rooms have windows that face the mountains. According to Col. Kevin Stanger, 21 Space Wing Dental Squadron commander, natural lighting enhances aesthetics and provides more effective dental prostheses to be fabricated since dental assistants can better match the color of patient’s teeth.
The new clinic also features a central instrument processing center that sterilizes equipment for use in medical procedures to minimize cross-contamination. Equipment in the CIPC removes a layer of potential human error in sterilization since medical devices can only be used in the clean room after they pass through CIPC sterilization equipment.
In addition to meeting its mission of providing dental care for active duty personnel, the new clinic is also certified by the as a LEED Gold healthcare structure by the U.S. Green Building Council. The building meets certain requirements as a sustainable site in water efficiency, energy and atmosphere, materials and resources and indoor environmental quality.
The building is heated and cooled by a geothermal well field. The water that circulates out of these wells maintains a constant 60 degrees, which can be used for both cooling and heating.
The dental clinic is one of a 10-building medical campus geographically distributed
across three military installations providing healthcare and mission-readiness support for more than 25,000 active duty, retired and family member DOD beneficiaries of the 21st Space Wing, 50th Space Wing, Colorado Springs community and 39 geographically separated units around the globe.
A ribbon cutting ceremony celebrating the newly-opened facility is being planned for December 18.