Victory For Dental Therapists As ‘Loophole’ Looks Set To Be Closed
- Details
- Published: Monday, 07 February 2022 22:09
- Written by Chris Tapper
- Hits: 14340
It now looks highly likely that the Dentists Act will be amended to prevent dentists who qualified overseas, from practising as dental therapists without facing any examination of their practical skills.
GDPUK was one of the first dental news outlets to raise the safety issue in 2019.
The British Association of Dental Therapists (BADT) originally raised concerns that overseas dentists from outside the European Union were circumventing the Overseas Registration Examination’s practical element and being registered by the General Dental Council.
This meant that dentists were able to carry out operative procedures with no direct check on their practical clinical skills being carried out.
In January 2020, around 50% of overseas dentists failed the practical manikin test in Part 2 of the ORE.
The GDC’s own statistics for the dentist’s overseas examination showed that in January and April of 2019, 56% and 43% of dentists respectively, failed the practical ‘dental manikin exercise,’ the test where their skills at drilling and filling are assessed directly.
BADT, joined by the British Society of Dental Hygiene and Therapy (BSDHT) have lobbied hard to bring about a change to Section 36C of the Dentists Act, which allowed dentists to join the Dental Register, despite not being trained in dental therapy.
A number of consultancy services grew up around the growing interest from overseas dentists in joining the dental register as therapists, offering guidance on how to secure registration.
In 2019, Dr Mick Armstrong, then Chair of the British Dental Association said “The BDA has noted with concern that overseas dentists who are required to sit the Overseas Registration Exam to work as dentists are attempting to register in dental care professional registration categories, often as hygienists or therapists. There also seems to be a specific recruitment drive to enable such registration.”
He added “Our concerns in this regard are both for the overseas dentists, who may be unfamiliar with the UK’s system, may lack professional support and run the risk of working outside relevant regulations and requirements, and for the patients they treat, as the competency assessment that has taken place for the purpose of registration is solely paper-based rather than clinical.”
Dental Nursing reported yesterday “Following work with the General Dental Council (GDC), the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) has today launched a consultation on its plans to amend the legislation governing routes to registration for dental professionals with qualifications gained outside the UK.”
GDPUK has seen the proposed change to Section 36C of the Dentists Act.
The Act will be amended so that applicants with a qualification in dentistry will not be entitled to register under any other particular title on the Dental Care Professional Register – this will include dental therapy.
The amendment if passed by both Houses of Parliament will read “Subsection 4 is amended to clarify that the qualification an applicant relies upon to satisfy the registrar that they are entitled to be registered under a particular title in the DCP register cannot be a diploma in dentistry, in line with the equivalent provision UK qualified applicants.”
Dental Nursing reported Stefan Czerniawski, GDC executive director for strategy as saying, “We welcome these proposals which we believe will ensure a proportionate, clear and robust route to registration for those who have qualified outside the UK. As proposed, these reforms will provide us with more flexibility to create new rules for international routes to registration and allow us to make the changes needed to ensure professionals who meet our high standards are able to register without unnecessary delay.”
The magazine said “The proposed changes will affect only new applicants to the GDC registers. The closing date for responses to the consultation is May 6, 2022.”
The proposed change is a marked turnaround from the GDC’s view in 2019.
In October of that year, the regulator maintained that its procedure for registering overseas dentists as dental therapists without a practical examination was ‘robust.’
At the time, the GDC declined to comment on the high failure rate of the practical examination by overseas dentists and the apparent anomaly in its regulations that allowed dentists to register as dental therapists, a role they have not specifically trained for, without further examination of their manual skills.
The GDC told GDPUK at the time that it had “Set out the robust processes in place to ensure individuals have the requisite level of knowledge, skill and experience prior to being able to join the Registers and, until there is evidence to the contrary, there are insufficient grounds to seek changes under section 60.”
The news of the proposed changes was warmly welcomed by Acting President and Chair of BADT, Debbie Hemington.
She told GDPUK “BADT welcomes the proposal for the much needed changes to the Dentists Act. It has taken a long, concerted effort by members of BADT joined by BSDHT, as well as other professional bodies, to get the Government and the General Dental Council to take our safety concerns on board and positively act on them.”
“The standards of UK-trained dental therapists is high and the profession welcomes the closure of this obvious ‘loophole’ in the Dentists Act which had the potential to undermine the integrity of dental therapy.”
Ms Hemington added “It also ensures a level playing field by bringing registration in line with the requirements placed on UK graduates.”
You need to be logged in to leave comments.
Report