What to expect from the GDC

The GDC cannot look into every concern about a dental professional, only those where there appears to be a risk to the safety of patients, colleagues or the public, or potential damage to public confidence in the profession.

A full investigation process can take as long as 18 months.

Please take a moment to read about what we can and cannot do below, to see whether contacting us is right for you. Case studies are available on our website, and you may find these helpful.

When can we take action?

If you think a dental professional may not be fit to do their work because of something they have done, their professional skills or their health, you should report this to us.

Here are some examples of the types of issues we are able to look into:

• Serious or repeated mistakes in patient care
• Failure to respond reasonably to a patient's needs, including referring for further investigations where necessary, although we cannot require a dentist to provide you with treatment
• Violence, sexual motivated or indecent behaviour
• Fraud
• Any serious criminal offences or criminal offence under the Dentists Act
• Discrimination against patients, colleagues or others
• Serious breaches of a patient's confidentiality or data protection requirements
• Serious concerns about knowledge of the English language

After we look into a concern, we may be able to:

• Give the dental professional a warning (private or published)
• Restrict through conditions the type of work carried out or how the dental professional works for a period of time (of up to 3 years)
• Stop the dental professional from doing any dental work for a fixed period of time (of up to 12 months) by suspending them from the register
• Take the dental professional off our register (known as erasure), which means they can no longer work in dentistry in the UK

However, we cannot:

• Help you with a claim for a refund or compensation
• Give you a detailed explanation of what happened to you - this can only come from the dental professional or the dental organisation concerned
• Fine a dental professional
• Make a dental professional give you access to your dental records
• Make a dental professional apologise to you
• Make a dental professional reinstate or add you to their practice's list of patients
• Make a dental professional change their fees for private treatment
• Make changes to your dental records
• Look into general concerns about how a dental practice is run
• Change the outcome of a local investigation into your complaint
• Look into concerns about healthcare professionals who are not dentists or dental care professionals
• Take action against a dental professional if there is no risk to patient safety, or to public confidence in the dental profession

Based on this, do you think your concern is something we will be able to look into?