The National Health Service (General Dental Services) Amendment Regulations 1998

Explanatory Note

(This note is not part of the Regulations)

These Regulations further amend the National Health Service (General Dental Services) Regulations 1992 (S.I. 1992/661) (“the 1992 Regulations”) which regulate the terms on which general dental services are provided under the National Health Service Act 1977.

Regulation 3 introduces definitions of words which refer to provisions in the National Health Service (Primary Care) Act 1997 (“the 1997 Act”).

Regulations 4, 5 and 8 require additional information to be provided by dentists who are applying to be included in a dental list of a Health Authority. Such dentists must now advise the Authority if they have insurance indemnity cover and if they are subject to any Home Office restrictions on employment.

Regulation 6 makes clear that a dentist, practising dentistry in either the Community Dental Service or the armed forces, needs to have practised primary dental care for four months (or its part time equivalent) in the four years preceding his application for a vocational training certificate if he is to benefit from the relevant exemption from vocational training.

Regulation 7 amends Schedule 1 to the 1992 Regulations, which contains dentists' terms of service. It includes a provision that dentists may terminate, with immediate effect, a capitation arrangement or a continuing care arrangement with a patient who has been violent to, or who has threatened with violence, the dentist or one of his employees. Where a dentist wishes to terminate a continuing care arrangement or a capitation arrangement because he intends to perform personal dental services under the 1997 Act, instead of being required to give patients three months of the termination he is required to give whatever notice is specified in the agreement under which he is to perform personal dental services. Regulation 7 also places a requirement on dentists to respond to a request for information about their professional indemnity insurance from a Health Authority on whose list they are included.

Regulation 9 amends Schedule 4 to the 1992 Regulations to increase from £200 to £230 the amount specified as the maximum cost, or likely cost, of care and treatment which a dentist may undertake without seeking the prior approval of the Dental Practice Board.

These Regulations impose no costs on business.