Premium
A review of the law of consent in dentistry
Author(s) -
Holden ACL,
Stewart C
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
australian dental journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.701
H-Index - 71
eISSN - 1834-7819
pISSN - 0045-0421
DOI - 10.1111/adj.12707
Subject(s) - allegation , dental practice , informed consent , relevance (law) , law , medicine , psychology , dentistry , engineering ethics , political science , alternative medicine , engineering , pathology
The development of the law of consent has led to much discussion within the dental literature as to how these changes might impact practice. The move from a practitioner‐focused standard of consent to a patient‐focused standard has altered the nature of the framework required to support a patient's decision‐making to avoid an allegation or finding of a negligent consent process. Contrastingly, there has been little in the way of exploration as to how the law of battery (in civil matters) and assault (in criminal cases), where consent is entirely absent, might apply to dentistry and the practice of the profession. This article considers the law of consent, using several key examples from dentistry, as well as providing an update of recent case law of relevance to dental practice.