The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is extending its national contact centre’s opening hours and publishing new guidance on registration to help support primary dental providers preparing to apply for registration under new legislation.
The Newcastle-based centre will now open from 8.30am to 8pm Monday to Thursday, from 8.30am to 5.30pm on Friday and from 8am to 4pm on Saturdays.
CQC has also issued new guidance for the providers of primary dental services, which is available on its website or in hard copy from the national contact centre (NCC) on 03000 616161.
The new guidance provides more information on the application process, which has been refined following a series of pilot projects. CQC is expecting applications from more than 8,500 providers.
Providers of dental services will soon start applying for registration with CQC with all providers to be registered from 1 April 2011.
Providers only need to apply for registration once. Due to an expected large amount of applications, providers will be put into groups with each group given an application window within which to apply. Services will be registered against the new essential standards of quality and safety that apply across the care sector.
The new system focuses on outcomes, the experiences CQC expects people to have, rather than on policies and processes. The aim of registration is that people can expect services to meet essential standards of quality, to protect their safety and to respect their dignity and rights wherever care is provided, wherever they live.
CQC director Linda Hutchinson said: "We appreciate that this type of regulation is very new to the dental sector and that people will have a lot of questions. We publish regular updates on our website, but we know that some people would prefer to talk things through over the phone. We want to make sure that our helpline is available to answer questions at times that are convenient to dentists, taking their working hours into consideration."
Dr Hutchinson added: "We're also working closely with the General Dental Council to avoid any overlap in our actions and to minimise any potential regulatory burden for providers. Ultimately, our objective is to protect service users and to encourage improvement in the care people receive."
For further information on the registration process, providers can sign up to CQC's monthly e-update for health and social care professionals at www.cqc.org.uk/get-our-newsletter and join CQC's provider reference group, an online community offering the opportunity to engage with our work through a variety of methods including surveys, discussion forms and polls. You can sign up by emailing cqc@nunwood.com.
We will be writing to providers to advise what will happen next and about further action that needs to be taken. For more information, email enquiries@cqc.org.uk.
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For further information please contact the CQC press office on 0207 448 9401 or out of hours on 07917 232 143.
About the Care Quality Commission
The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of all health and adult social care in England. We inspect all health and adult social care services in England, whether they are provided by the NHS, local authorities, private companies or voluntary organisations. We also seek to protect the interests of people whose rights are restricted under the Mental Health Act. We make sure that essential common standards of quality are met everywhere care is provided, from hospitals to private care homes, and we work towards their improvement. We promote the rights and interests of people who use services and we have a wide range of enforcement powers to take action on their behalf if services are unacceptably poor.
Our work brings together (for the first time) independent regulation of health, mental health and adult social care. Before 1 April 2009, this work was carried out by the Healthcare Commission, the Mental Health Act Commission and the Commission for Social Care Inspection.
Our aim is to make sure that better care is provided for everyone, whether it is in hospital, in care homes, in people’s own homes, or anywhere else that care is provided.
Registration: The Health and Social Care Act 2008 introduced a new, single registration system that applies to both health and adult social care. The new system will make sure that people can expect services to meet new essential standards of quality and safety that respect their dignity and protect their rights. The new system is focused on outcomes, rather than systems and processes, and places the views and experiences of people who use services at its centre.
Since 1 April 2010, all NHS care providers are required by law to be registered with CQC and must show that they are meeting the essential standards. All adult social care and independent healthcare providers must be registered under the 2008 Act (which replaces the Care Standards Act 2000) from 1 October this year. Registration isn’t just about initial application for registration. We will continuously monitor compliance with the essential standards as part of a new, more dynamic, responsive and robust system of regulation.
More information for dentists
If you a dentist registered with us, you can find more information in our Registered services section.
If you are a new provider of dental services, you can find out how to register with us in our guidance on Registering for the first time.