title: Regulators and regulations: who will guard the guards? (or 'Quis custodiet ipsos custodes' as old Juvenal used to say).
abstract: Overbearing regulators with their various labyrinthine regulations have had adverse impacts on dentists and their teams' behaviours. This has produced the perverse outcomes of demoralizing dental teams as well as reducing their capacity and/or desire to deliver compassionate oral healthcare. These adverse outcomes do not seem to have benefited patients, or dentists, or their teams, in any sensible or measurable way. CPD/CLINICAL RELEVANCE: The vastly increased burdens on the UK dental profession of intrusive, bullying regulations, emanating from the various UK agencies, such as the supposedly fair and independent GDC, but including the increasingly politically controlled NHS and the CQC, have had unfortunate, perverse, effects on many dentists' clinical practices and affected dental teams' desires, or willingness, to be as compassionate as they used to be about helping to solve some patients' dental or oral problems.
authors.forename: Martin
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Kelleher
mesh_terms: D003258:Consumer Behavior; D003365:Costs and Cost Analysis; D003729:Dental Care / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D003815:Dentists / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D003778:Dentures / Q000191:economics; D034462:Dissent and Disputes; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational / Q000191:economics; D004990:Ethics, Dental; D033161:Government Regulation; D015438:Health Behavior; D017048:Health Care Costs; D006801:Humans; D007879:Legislation, Dental; D008005:Licensure, Dental / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence; D012051:Reimbursement Mechanisms / Q000191:economics; D012390:Root Canal Therapy / Q000191:economics / Q000592:standards; D059039:Standard of Care; D013218:State Dentistry / Q000191:economics / Q000331:legislation & jurisprudence*; D006113:United Kingdom