Report on Dental Practice Regulations, Ethics, and Patient Support

This report provides a comprehensive overview of dental practice, focusing on the rules, regulations, and ethical guidelines that govern the profession. It delves into the requirements for competent, effective, and safe practice, emphasizing the importance of adhering to codes of conduct and legal frameworks, including the Health and Safety at Work Act and data protection laws. The report examines procedures for handling complaints, highlighting the significance of clear communication and fair investigation. It also explores the role of the General Dental Council (GDC) in setting standards and providing ethical guidance, including patient expectations and the principles of patient autonomy, non-maleficence, beneficence, justice, and veracity. Furthermore, the report discusses the importance of providing active support and feedback to both patients and the dental team to ensure the delivery of high-quality care. The report emphasizes the need for dental practitioners to prioritize patient well-being, maintain integrity, and foster effective communication within the dental environment.

Dental

Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Task 1...............................................................................................................................................1
1. Requirements of competent, effective and safe practice in dental.....................................1
Task 2...............................................................................................................................................3
1. Procedures for handling complaints in dental practice.......................................................3
2. Various legal and regulatory requirements, professional codes of practice and
organisational policy..............................................................................................................3
3. GDC ethical and professional guidance.............................................................................5
4. Providing active support and feedback for individuals and key people within the team is an
important part of dental nurses’ role......................................................................................6
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................7

Introduction
The term dental health means providing best practice to the patients so that the oral
treatment can be given to the patients. This helps in providing the best oral hygiene to the
patients and to prevent complications such as tooth decay and gum disease and to maintain the
overall health of your mouth. This report is based on the rules and regulations that the dental
practitioner should follow. Also the expectations of the patients are discussed in this report. At
last the description of how to provide the active support and feedback for dental care is analysed
in this report.
Task 1
1. Requirements of competent, effective and safe practice in dental
In dental practice it is seen that there are various code of conduct and the component that
dental practitioners has to follow so that they are able to achieve the objective of providing safe
practice to the users of the dental. The dental practitioners should follow the standard where they
should follow:
 They should listen to the patients problems first
 They should treat patients with dignity and respect all the time.
 They should be honest and act with integrity with the patients.
 They should take the holistic and the preventive approach so that the patients are taken
care of easily and the is appropriate with the requirements of the patients.
The health and safety at work act 1974 guides the department to perform the safety check while
engaged in the dental practice. Hence for this it should be the duty of every practitioners to
ensure that health and safety is ensured at the work place. It should be the duty of the dental
practitioner to ensure that the health and safety of the employees should be taken care of which
they are exposed to while performing their duty.
Through these practices that are taken into consideration the patients would be treated
very significantly and would also help the practitioners to provide the best service as required by
various laws.
1

Department of Health
Guidelines and Regulations
Guidelines
 Put patient's interest first.
 Communicate in effective manner with sick people.
 Obtain valid consent.
 Maintain and protect patient's information.
 Have a clear and effective complaints procedures.
 Work with colleagues appropriately as per best interest
of patient.
 Maintain, develop and work within professionals skills
and knowledge.
 Raise concerns if patients are at risk.
 Ensure to maintain confidence of patient through proper
behaviour and dental profession.
Regulations
 Data Protection Act 1988
 Health and Safety Act 1974
 Medicines Act 1968
Social media Roles of social media in dental care
 Promotion of oral care.
 Improving dental care by using correct technique.
 Make people comfortable with dentists.
 Improve awareness of people about dental problems.
 Encourage people to take precautions to avoid dental
issues.
Care Quality Commission Roles of CQC in dental care
 This organisation provide appropriate guidelines to
practitioners to provide dental care.
 They have a role to conduct inspections in healthcare
organisation to ensure proper care.
2

 They make sure safe, effective and high quality care in
dental care homes.
 CQC encourage healthcare organisations to improve
quality and effectiveness of care facilities.
Task 2
1. Procedures for handling complaints in dental practice
For making a good dental practice and providing the patients a right to complaint for any
unethical or wrong service provided to the client. There are various procedures that are done
some of which includes the following:
 The dental team and the clinic staff should ensure that there is an effective written
complaints procedures in the clinic.
 The management and the team in the dental clinic should respond to the complaints at the
time which are set out of procedures.
 The staff should check out and ensure that all the clients are well known about the
complaints procedures that are set by the clinic.
 The clinic should ensure that the complaint procedure should be displayed where the
patients are able to see it.
 The steps of complaints must be written in plain language and is available in other
formats as and when required.
 The clinic should be allowed to investigate about the compliant in a full and the fair
manner.
2. Various legal and regulatory requirements, professional codes of practice and organisational
policy.
There are various policies that are required to be followed by the dental practitioners so
that ethical code of conduct are followed by the company. These ethical codes and the
regulations makes the dental practitioners to provide best service to the users. In UK there is a
GDC which helps the country and the dental practitioners to create new laws as and when
required:
3

There are various regulations and the laws that are specified for the dental practitioners
some of which are defined below as:
 Data protection Act: The data protection act is considered as one of the most important
law and the regulation that the dental practitioners should follow so that the data of the
patients can be kept at securely. This is the duty of the dental nurse and the practitioners
to not to disclose any of the private information of the patients to any third part except on
the discretion of the patient himself.
 Department of health guidelines and regulations: These are considered as one of the main
department which helps the dental practitioners and the nurses to provide better care to
the patients. As this provides the guidelines on the dental and the oral health. This helps
the practitioners to get a trained employees and the contractual arrangements for the
same. Through this they would be able to achieve the objective of making a good and
effective clinic.
 Direct access: The GDC council in the year 2013 removed the direct access barrier for
some of the dental care professionals which has the impact on the patient safety. This
means that patients had to be seen by the dentist before they are treated by the member of
the dental team.
 Discrimination: The Equality Act 2010 refers to legal regulations which encourage to
maintain equality in dental care while providing treatment to people. It will facilitate
remove factor of discrimination in dental care which help to ensure proper delivery of
services to every person for their well being.
 Rights: There are several rights of patients which should be followed dental nurse while
providing care facilities to them. It includes Right to information, emergency medical
care, informed consent, confidentiality, human dignity & privacy, non- discrimination,
safety & quality care as per set standards and select alternative treatment options.
 Principles of information governance: This involves to maintain privacy and safety of
information related to patients which should be ensured by dental nurse by following
desired principles. It involves number of principles related to accountability,
transparency, integrity, protection, compliance, availability, retention and disposition
which should be considered by dental nurse appropriately.
4

3. GDC ethical and professional guidance
It is seen that the standards that are formed by the GDC council applies to dentists, dental
nurses, dental hygienists, dental therapists, clinical dental technicians and etc. it is seen that the
principles are equally important for all the practitioners. There are various requirements that are
needed by the patients to follow and they expects fair and just practice that the dentist should
follow.
Standards fore dental team
Patient expectations
 They should be listened to and should have their preferences and concerns in it.
 They should be treated as individuals and the should have their cultures and values
respected at any cost.
 Dental practitioners should remain honest and act with integrity.
 Professionals are required to follow legislations and provide treatment in clean & safe
environment.
 They expects that all the members of the dental team would be honest towards them and
would work with integrity.
 They should check and redress the impact if the patient suffers harm during the dental
treatment.
Principles
 Patient autonomy
 Non maleficence
 Beneficence
 Justice
 Veracity
 Effective communication
Standards & guidance
 Dental practitioners are required to follow equality act to reduce discrimination and
facilitate proper treatment to every one.
 They must listen carefully and patiently with people.
 Obey laws and regulations in accurate way.
 Provide care services fairly and avoid discrimination strictly.
5

Preparing for practice
 Preparing final year undergraduates and vocational dental professionals to difficult
transition into primary care.
 Aids an understand among integration of several aspects that are related to dental primary
care.
 It consist to encourage holistic approach to care in line thoruhg present teaching
procedures.
Scope of practice
 Prepare, mix and handle biomaterial used in dental care by practitioners.
 Conduct prevention and control activities for infection to avoid any kind of
contamination.
 Dental nursing staff is required to maintain clinical environment appropriate by
considering desired equipments used.
They should also follow different scope of practice which means that they should be
trained and competent to do so. This describes that the areas in which the knowledge, skills and
the experience should be done effectively with the interest of patients.
Fitness to practice guidance
Also their include the fitness to practice which means that they have the skills,
knowledge and the character to provide the service of dental care. If a registered dentist or dental
care professional fails to meet the standards set by the GDC we can:
 Restrict what they can do professionally.
 Remove them from the Register.
4. Providing active support and feedback for individuals and key people within the team is an
important part of dental nurses’ role.
It is important for the dental care practitioners to provide the active support and feedback
so that the dentists and the clients receive the best service which they can except. The role of
nurse includes setting the positioning the meetings with the patients and allocating the team
members for caring the patients. Also the nurse performs the duty to engage the patients in a way
so that they are able to achieve the patients good health. The nurse performs the duty to organise
the schedules and the plans so that patients are able to achieve the best practice.
Patients and team members The active support should be provided for patients who are not
6

able to communicate properly. Feedback about their practices
should be render to team members working for specific patient
to improve their facilities for welfare of an individual.
Carers The technical support is required to be provided for carers in
order to improve care services and feedbacks about threats of
their performance to gain better outcomes of medication.
Others who have a supportive The active support from carer should be provide to family
members and relatives to take care of patient in proper way to
reduce chance of occurring problems.
Conclusion
From the above report it is analysed that the rules and regulations are one of the main part
which helps in governing the dental practice. It is the duty of the dental practitioner to provide
best practice to the patients so that their oral health can be boosted.
7