Listening to your views
"Policy is developed on the basis of consultation and evidence"
In order to protect the public by regulating the dental team, we need to listen and understand the views of the public, patients and registrants.
The GDC will draw upon these views to make policy and decisions on the basis of the best available evidence.
The GDC uses a range of research and consultation methods to produce robust evidence and to reach as wide and diverse audience as possible.
These include:
- Publishing a consultation document on the GDC website where you can let us know your view on key policies and procedures. The document which provides background to the issue, sets out the purpose of the consultation, and explains how to respond, via a questionnaire and the deadline for a response.
- Representative research surveys of patients, public and registrants which produce reliable evidence about what you think
- Focus Groups and workshops to enable in depth and deliberative discussion of issues and to target sections of the general and registrant population not reached by other consultation methods
- Providing opportunities for feedback and open calls for ideas on key issues.
The GDC will share the key findings and results from consultation and research by publishing details on this page.
Modernisation of the General Dental Council's fitness to practise procedures
We are working to create more efficient fitness to practise procedures and we want your views about our proposals. Find out more about the consultation.
Standards for Education
We are currently undertaking a survey on proposed Standards for Education Providers. These describe those areas that we will focus on when quality assuring qualifications leading to first registration. Find out more about the survey.
Annual patient and public survey
The GDC carried out a major survey of patient and public attitudes to dentistry and dental regulation in April 2011. More information about the survey can be found on the annual patient and public survey page.
Annual registrant survey
The GDC carried out a major survey of registered dental professionals' attitudes to dentistry, dental regulation, and the GDC in May/June 2011. More information about the survey can be found on the annual registrant survey page. Public attitudes to tooth whitening
The General Dental Council has carried out an opinion survey with patients and the public about attitudes to tooth whitening. The results and key findings from the survey can be found here:
Public attitudes to tooth whitening (543KB, PDF)
Patient and public attitudes to Standards guidance
The GDC carried out research with the general public and patients to explore their views on the content of Standards guidance for dental professionals which is currently being reviewed. The report below summarises the key findings of the research which form part of the consultation on the Standards review.
Public attitudes to standards for dental professionals (690KB, PDF)
Modernisation of fitness to practise procedures
We have now closed a feedback exercise, seeking views on proposals to modernise our fitness to practise procedures. This work is part of the on-going review of the GDC’s fitness to practise process. At this stage, we are seeking feedback to some early proposals to assist us in developing them further. Views will be reflected in a feedback summary paper which will be presented to the December 2011 Council meeting.
If Council decides to continue with the development of these proposals after reviewing this paper, a full public consultation will be launched in early 2012 to take account of public, patient, registrant and stakeholder views on the proposals. The feedback exercise ran between 17 October and 15 November.
Modernisation of GDC's fitness to practise procedures (325KB, PDF)