Ethics and Ethical Standards for Dentists and Dental Professionals CPD course for Dentists and the whole dental team facing a GDC fitness to practise investigation, complaint or Practice Committee hearing — and for your CPD

A patient has complained

How the practice responds is itself governed by principle 5, and a mishandled complaint frequently becomes the larger problem.

A GDC investigation is open

The course covers the actions the GDC can take and the remediation steps that answer a concern before it escalates.

The concern involves consent or cost

What was explained, what was agreed, and whether any of it was written down.

You are a dental nurse, hygienist or therapist

All seven registered titles are covered, and so is the fitness to practise process.

You are applying for restoration

You do not need to be registered to take this.

You are building your CPD

Two verifiable hours, with a certificate recording the title, the hours and the date.

Consent, Options and Cost

Treatment the patient says they did not agree to, options not offered, or a bill larger than the one they expected.

NHS and Private Confusion

A patient who believed they were being treated on the NHS, or who did not understand that a private alternative was a choice rather than a requirement.

Complaints Handling

Principle 5. Delay, defensiveness, or a response that argued rather than listened, a breach in its own right whatever the original issue.

Records

Notes and treatment plans too thin to show what was discussed, agreed or charged for, and the difficulty of answering a consent complaint without them.

Candour After Something Went Wrong

An extraction that was not what the patient expected, a restoration that failed, or an error, and whether they were told promptly and openly.

Conduct and Boundaries

Principle 9 covers personal behaviour that affects confidence in the profession, including conduct towards colleagues in a small practice team.

Overview of healthcare ethics

What healthcare ethics is, why it matters in dentistry specifically, and the GDC's role in setting and enforcing standards

The core ethical principles

Autonomy, beneficence and non-maleficence together, justice, and confidentiality

Integrity, candour and records

Maintaining honesty and integrity, the duty of candour, and documentation and record-keeping, including the written treatment plan

Patient-centred care and shared decisions

Informed consent and patient communication, where cost, options and the NHS-versus-private distinction all have to be made clear

Professional boundaries and conduct

Maintaining appropriate boundaries and GDC guidance on where they sit, including conduct with colleagues in a small practice team

Breaches of ethical standards

Common breaches in dental practice, their consequences, the actions the GDC can take, and the steps to remediate

Conclusion and assessment

Conclusion and takeaways, followed by a post-course assessment. Certificate issued on completion

Valid consent

Principle 3. In dentistry it carries a requirement most of healthcare does not: understanding the options and what each costs, in writing, before treatment starts.

Written treatment plan and estimate

The record that a cost discussion happened. Without it, a later dispute comes down to two recollections, and the patient's is the one being asked about.

Complaints procedure

Principle 5 requires every practice to have one that is clear and effective, judged separately from whatever the complaint was about.

The dental team

All seven titles the GDC registers, not just dentists. The nine principles and the fitness to practise process apply without variation.

Duty of candour

Telling a patient promptly when something has gone wrong, apologising, and explaining what happened and what will be done about it.

Insight

Understanding what went wrong, why, and the effect it had, together with what has changed as a result. It is shown rather than claimed.

Put patients' interests first

Communicate effectively with patients

Obtain valid consent

The principle this course is built on, because in dentistry it includes the cost. Its guidance asks for the options with a breakdown of costs, and treats consent as an ongoing process shared across the dental team.

Maintain and protect patients' information

Have a clear and effective complaints procedure

Unusual among the regulators, and the reason how you respond to a complaint is a standard in itself.

Work with colleagues in a way that is in patients' best interests

Maintain, develop and work within your professional knowledge and skills

Raise concerns if patients are at risk

Make sure your personal behaviour maintains patients' confidence in you and the profession

Covers conduct outside the surgery, and conduct towards colleagues in a small practice team.

Dentists

Usually the treating clinician and often the practice owner, so a concern can engage clinical judgement, consent and complaints handling at the same time.

Dental nurses

The largest registered group by some distance, and the most likely to assume a course titled for dentists is not for them. It is.

Dental hygienists and therapists

Often working with a degree of independence, including under direct access, which puts consent and scope of practice on you rather than a referring dentist.

Dental technicians and clinical dental technicians

Rarely meeting the patient does not remove the standards; clinical dental technicians who do treat patients directly for dentures carry consent and complaints duties exactly as a dentist does.

Orthodontic therapists

Working to a prescription and often over long courses of treatment, where consent is revisited as the plan develops.

Students and trainees

Welcome, and more useful before you need it. Training providers apply professionalism expectations that anticipate the nine principles.

Before anything else, do not amend the records

Practice software logs every amendment, and a note changed after a concern has been raised turns a consent question into an honesty one. If something needs adding, add it openly as a new, dated entry.

Give options and costs in writing, every time

A written plan and estimate before treatment starts, covering what each option costs rather than only the one you recommend.

Re-plan when the price or the treatment changes

A new conversation and a new record, not an assumption that the original agreement stretches. This is where a straightforward treatment most often turns into a complaint about a bill.

Fix the complaints procedure, and prove it ran

A written procedure, a named person, a timescale, and a file showing the next complaint was handled to it.

Apologise before you discuss money

A refund offered before an apology reads as an attempt to close the matter rather than answer it.

Get somebody outside the practice to check

A peer reading a sample of your treatment plans against one question: can you tell what was offered, what it cost and what the patient agreed to?

The pair to this course: how you conducted yourself, and the Enhanced CPD development outcomes.

Consent as a continuous process, and the privacy around close-work treatment.

Where treatment is sold as well as provided — conflicts of interest and commercial pressure.

First steps, what not to do, and how to respond to the person who complained.