Professional Conduct, Ethics, Patient Records, and Mandatory Reporting
Domain 6 tests conduct obligations that show up in discipline cases far more often than clinical error: consent, records, abandonment, confidentiality, and reporting duties.
Records that survive review
Entries must be legible, contemporaneous, signed or initialed with credentials, and specific about what was done, on which tooth surfaces, with which anesthetic and dose. Records are retained for the period the Board requires and released on proper patient authorization. Altering a record after the fact is treated far more harshly than the original error.
Consent and confidentiality
Informed consent means the patient understood risks, alternatives, and consequences and agreed. Confidentiality continues after care ends; disclosing patient information on social media, even without a name, can identify a patient and is a violation.
Abandonment
You may end a relationship, but not mid-treatment and not without notice, an opportunity to complete urgent care, and time to transfer records.
Mandatory reporting
- Suspected child abuse or neglect must be reported under New Jersey's child protection statute.
- Suspected abuse of an elder or vulnerable adult must be reported.
- Suspected unlicensed practice and serious licensee misconduct go to the Board.
- A licensee with a substance use or impairment problem should self-refer to the Board's professional assistance program rather than wait for a complaint.
Worked example
A patient's new employer faxes asking for the full chart. Analysis: an employer is not the patient. Release requires the patient's signed authorization, a subpoena, or another recognized legal basis; without it, provide nothing and document the request and refusal.
Traps
Charting a procedure you did not perform, and assuming a report requires proof - reasonable suspicion is the standard.