Dental Tribune UK Edition, October 4-10, 2010, No.24 Vol.4

W ith more than 9,000 different colleagues visiting the site dur- ing the month, GDPUK is bus- ier than ever in the autumn and colleagues reading the forum are looking forwaard to the upcoming GDPUK Confer- ence in Manchester (see http:// w w w. g d p u k . c o m / C o n f e r - ence2010). Concerns about the CQC and HTM 01-05 continue to dominate discussions; these are clearly the topics at the top of the agenda for all dentists. For many reasons, the en- hanced Criminal Record Bureau check for dentists demanded by the CQC has raised ire amongst forum members. CQC speak- ers have always stressed that the role of the registration was to protect the public with regard to the premises – are they safe for the public and are processes and procedures correct? - In other words, regulating the provider. The GDC remains responsible for making sure the public is treated and cared for by suitably qualified professionals, the per- formers. So why the CQC needs to make all dentists have a further CRB check is questioned. All the forms necessary for this must be taken personally, by every single dentist, together with passport, photos and further proof of iden- tity to a Crown Post Office. There are only 27 of these Post Offices in England, and many dentists will have to spend time travel- ling and queuing at that office, possibly a full day. For example, for the whole of Yorkshire, about two thousand dentists, there is one such Crown Office, in Leeds. Imagine the queues if all 2,000 visited on one day! As one senior notable colleague wrote in the fo- rum “what sort of moron sits in their glass palace in Westminster and thinks up ideas like this?” Back to the HTM 01-05 docu- ment that continues to dog the profession: One concern has been that washer disinfectors, in their final heat cycle, bake proteins (onto) only stainless steel instru- ments. In letters to colleagues in response to specific enquiries, the DH are now rebutting this, having commissioned research at the University of London. This research will be published in due course. Some GDPUK cor- respondents still believe that it is best not to buy or use one of those machines, not needed to reach “essential requirements” but re- quired to reach “best practice”. In the same vein, a dentist wrote (in a dental discussion in another dental publication) that after 35 years in practice the lat- est wave of regulations, paper- work and interference were too much, and retirement beckoned - even though the dentist insist- ed he enjoys his daily work, and finds helping patients daily to be rewarding. I found it uncomfort- able to read that so many agreed with his sentiments. Creating new documents for consent to various procedures have been discussed, and will be shared in the files section of GDPUK. Apparently, when questions about this are put to lawyers, these days, they in- sist that risk of death is placed as the number one risk at the start of all these documents. Pa- tients could have a reaction to local anaesthetic, and this reac- tion could ultimately be fatal, so perhaps this warning should be to all dental consent documents? Would you be com- fortable warning every patient of this? That is a sobering thought for us all. DT GDPUK Roundup The GDPUK online community discusses the upcoming confer- ence in Manchester and regulatory issues. Tony Jacob has more msc_ad_source_uk.pdf 1 03/08/2009 15:21:59 October 4-10, 20106 News United Kingdom Edition