A complaint has been made

By a patient, directly or to the GOsC, and you need to respond with something behind it. Start now — evidence built early always reads better than evidence assembled before a deadline.

A GOsC investigation is open

Section 7 covers the investigation process, the consequences that can follow, and the remediation that answers a concern.

Consent or boundaries are in question

The two areas most often engaged in osteopathic concerns, and the two this course spends the most time on.

You are applying for restoration

You are off the register and working towards going back on it. What you did in the meantime is the heart of the application, and you do not need to be registered to take this.

You are building your CPD

Two verifiable hours you can complete and record the same day, with a certificate showing the title, the hours and the date.

Nothing has been raised

You practise single-handed or in a small clinic, and would rather your consent and record-keeping stood up to scrutiny before anyone examines them.

Consent across a course of treatment

Consent taken once at assessment and never revisited, techniques not explained, or a patient who says they did not know what was going to happen.

Professional boundaries

Boundary concerns in hands-on practice, dual relationships in small communities, contact through personal accounts, and the absolute prohibition on sexual relationships with patients.

Advertising and claims

What treatment is said to achieve, in the clinic and online. In largely private practice these claims are made directly to the person paying, which is why they attract scrutiny.

Record-keeping

Notes too thin to show what was discussed, agreed or examined — and the near-impossibility of defending a consent complaint without them.

Confidentiality and data

Patient information in a small practice: who can see it, how it is stored, and what may be shared with family, insurers or other practitioners.

Candour after something goes wrong

An adverse reaction, an unexpected outcome, or a mistake — and whether the patient was told promptly, openly and with an apology.

Ethics in osteopathic practice

Four lessons: what healthcare ethics means in osteopathy, how ethics in the profession has developed, why it matters in care, and the role of the General Osteopathic Council.

The core ethical principles

Five lessons: autonomy and informed consent, beneficence, non-maleficence, justice and fairness, and confidentiality and data protection.

GOsC standards and guidance

Four lessons: an overview of the Osteopathic Practice Standards, patient safety, communication and trust, the CPD scheme, and the complaints and fitness to practise process.

Integrity and duty of candour

Four lessons: honesty in clinical advice and communication, ethical advertising and marketing, the duty of candour, and record-keeping and documentation.

Patient-centred care and shared decisions

Four lessons: respecting patient values and preferences, effective communication, informed consent for ongoing care, and safeguarding and vulnerable patients.

Professional boundaries

Four lessons: maintaining appropriate boundaries, conflicts of interest and financial transparency, digital and social media boundaries, and managing inappropriate behaviour.

Breaches of ethical standards

Four lessons: the common ethical breaches, their consequences, the GOsC investigation process, and remediation and demonstrating insight.

Conclusion and assessment

Conclusion and key takeaways, followed by a post-course assessment. Your certificate is issued on completion.

Continuing consent

Consent understood as a process running through a course of treatment rather than a permission granted once. A plan agreed at assessment sets a direction; it does not authorise each session that follows, and it does not cover a technique or a region never discussed.

Osteopathic Practice Standards

The standards of conduct, ethics and competence required of osteopaths, arranged under four themes and published by the GOsC with guidance to help meet them. A response written against the theme actually engaged reads far better than one written in general terms.

Contemporaneous note

An entry made at the time or as soon as possible afterwards. In hands-on practice it is usually the only trace of a spoken consent discussion, which is why a brief note written then outweighs a detailed account written after a complaint arrives.

Duty of candour

The professional obligation to tell a patient promptly when something has gone wrong, apologise, and explain what happened and what you will do about it. Working single-handed removes the organisational scaffolding but not the obligation.

Professional boundary

The limit that keeps a clinical relationship therapeutic rather than personal, held in place by the osteopath rather than the patient. It runs in both directions, and where a patient initiates, the responsibility for holding it still rests with you.

Insight

Understanding what went wrong, why, and the effect it had on the patient and on confidence in the profession — together with what has changed as a result. It is what a response is read for, and it is shown rather than claimed.

The plan is not the consent

A treatment plan agreed at assessment sets a direction. It does not authorise each subsequent session, and a patient who agreed to a course of care has not agreed to whatever it turns into.

New technique, new region, new conversation

Where you propose something you have not done before with this patient, or move to an area not previously discussed, that is a fresh consent conversation however routine it feels to you.

It has to appear in the notes

A discussion nobody recorded is a discussion you cannot evidence. Brief entries at the time carry far more weight than a detailed account written after a complaint arrives.

It can be withdrawn at any point

During a session as much as between them. The patient should know that before treatment starts, and be able to stop without having to justify it.

Communication and patient partnership

The theme covering communication, building an effective partnership with the patient, and consent. Most osteopathic concerns engage this theme before any other, and the GOsC’s own overview describes it as supporting therapeutic relationships built on good communication, trust and confidence.

Knowledge, skills and performance

Osteopaths must have the knowledge and skills to practise as primary healthcare professionals, and must maintain and develop them throughout their careers.

Safety and quality in practice

The standards governing the delivery of care itself — high-quality and safe healthcare, and everything that supports it.

Professionalism

Acting with honesty and integrity, and upholding high standards of professional and personal conduct to maintain public trust and confidence in the profession. The GOsC groups clear professional boundaries, the duty of candour and the confidential management of patient information under this theme.

Before anything else: do not amend the records

Not to clarify, not to complete, not to add the consent discussion you know took place. Altering notes after a concern has been raised turns a care or records problem into a probity one, and practice software logs every change with a timestamp. If something genuinely needs adding, take advice first and add it openly as a new, dated entry.

Revisit consent at the start of each session

A sentence is enough: what you propose today, why, and a check that the patient is still content. It takes seconds, it is the change most directly aimed at how osteopathic complaints actually arise, and you can start it at your next appointment.

Write down what was discussed, not only what was done

The technique proposed, the region, anything the patient asked, and that they were told they could stop. Two lines at the time is worth more than two pages later, and it is the entry that makes a consent complaint answerable.

Say that treatment can stop at any point

Before you begin, not as an afterthought. Patients who have been told this explicitly are markedly less likely to feel they endured something they had not agreed to, which is the complaint this addresses.

Get somebody outside the practice to look

A peer, a former tutor, or a colleague in another clinic who will read a sample of your notes and tell you whether the consent discussion is visible in them. Single-handed practice has no second reader by default, and your own account of your own records is the weakest evidence available.

Review it again a few months on

Look at a fresh sample with the same person and see whether the change held. Sustained change that somebody else has confirmed is the strongest evidence you can put in front of the GOsC, and it takes elapsed time that cannot be manufactured later.

How you conducted yourself, where this one covers how decisions were reached.

Consent as a continuous process and the privacy around it — directly relevant to hands-on practice.

Boundaries in hands-on practice, chaperones, drift and conduct towards colleagues, in depth.

Being open when something goes wrong, and apologising in a way that stops a concern escalating.

Records as evidence — where a consent discussion either appears or does not.

The element assessed in almost every case, and the one most often described as lacking.

How to write reflection that reads as understanding rather than regret, in your own words.

Turning insight into concrete, evidenced change a panel can verify.