Furthermore, the Department of Health through the CQC and other bodies has recently been increasing both the scope and depth of regulatory, governance, quality and efficiency regimes. The Company believes that regulatory obligations will continue to increase. Also, due to the regulatory environment, there is little opportunity for dental practices to shop outside of the EU while remaining compliant with regulatory requirements in relation to the dental laboratories.
All of this is necessary for the corporate groups due to The Health and Social Care Act 2008 (the 2008 Act). The 2008 Act requires all dentists and the corporate groups to comply with certain specified outcomes set out in the 2008 Act (Outcomes) or face disciplinary action from the GDC, or even a criminal prosecution in the extreme.
Under the 2008 Act, the following Outcomes are most relevant to the Cable Dental products:
- Outcome 2 – Consent to Care & Treatment
- Outcome 3 – Fees
- Outcome 4 – Care & Welfare of Patients
- Outcome 8 – Cleanliness & Infection Control
- Outcome 12 – Requirements Relating to Workers
- Outcome 16 – Assessing and Monitoring the Quality of Service Provided
- Outcome 21 – Records
Cable Dental provides its clients with the tools for ensuring compliance with the above Outcomes in so far as they relate to their supplier laboratories, such that they need to worry less about compliance in these areas going forward. For a long time historically compliance was only a primary concern of the dentist and the clinicians. However, the CQC which enforces adherence to the 2008 Act, has shifted the responsibility such that it now equally applies to the corporate group, as well as the dentists.
Furthermore, Cable Dental enables easy production of the following reports which are hugely rich in data and good administration of the single practice business model all the way to the dental corporate business model:
- Remake rate by laboratory
- Remake rate by product
- Remake rate by dentist
- Total purchases by laboratory and product
- Laboratory ‘Audit Card’ feedback report
- Dentist ‘Audit Card’ feedback report
- Case return warning report
- Laboratory cost saving report
- Statement checking report
- Statement variance report, and
- Precious metal use, by dentist and laboratory.
Governance is the key. We suggest to our clients that prior to using any laboratory, and definitely prior to sending work, dentists/laboratories must supply to their dentists' and/or corporate group:
- Copies of GDC certificates of current registration;
- Copy of MHRA registration confirmation letter;
- A declare relating to the outsourcing of work;
- Full price list; and
- Example of ‘Statement of Manufacture’.
The Company also advises on bespoke governance additions to increase control of laboratory usage, such as:
- Banding of laboratories based on statutory requirements of the system;
- DAMAS membership; and
- ISO9001 Certification.
The Cable Dental products provide dentists with a facility which can show the full “footprint” of each custom made device (also known as laboratory products) provided to patients. Every laboratory providing products on the Cable Dental platform is required to prove its legitimacy to supply custom made devices. In addition to providing protection in the event of any litigation against the dentist, it can also be viewed as enhancing the qualitative process and clinical freedom of dentists by providing a real time data feedback on laboratories and all key information at the time of purchase. Cable Dental aims to ensure that dentists have access to high quality laboratory work at the best available prices so they can make informed decisions about where to buy and what to pay.