Final answer:
Unlicensed Assistive Personnel (UAP) can provide mouth care and denture cleansing for patients, following proper procedures and infection control precautions to maintain oral hygiene and overall health.
Step-by-step explanation:
Unlicensed Assistive Personnel (UAP), such as nursing assistants, are indeed trained and permitted to provide basic care activities, including mouth care and denture cleansing for patients. These tasks are significant because they help maintain oral hygiene and overall health.
When performing mouth care and denture cleansing, UAPs follow specific protocols. For mouth care, they would assist patients with brushing their teeth or, if the patient is unable to do so, they would use swabs to clean the mouth. For denture cleansing, they carefully handle the dentures, brushing and rinsing them with a denture cleaner, and then making sure they are safely stored if not replaced in the patient's mouth.
It is crucial for UAPs to take infection control precautions such as wearing gloves and properly disposing of any materials used during mouth care and denture cleansing to prevent cross-contamination.