Leading the way

In September 2023 the Royal College of Surgeons of England published a report titled ‘Breaking the Silence: Addressing Sexual Misconduct in Healthcare’ to stamp out sexual misconduct, sexual harassment and sexual assault. The Royal College of Edinburgh in January 2024 also launched a campaign to raise awareness and encourage zero tolerance of sexual misconduct in healthcare. Both colleges have close ties with dentistry and an inference that such matters of misconduct were likely to be worse for nursing staff, became the backdrop of the work of the Society of British Dental Nurses.

The initial survey was aimed at dental nurses and dental nurse students, as they were the primary audience of the Society of British Dental Nurses (from here on the Society of British Dental Nurses will be identified as ‘The society’). Whilst the initial survey was titled Sexual Misconduct at Work, it soon became apparent that the title in itself became a barrier to dental nurses and dental nurse students speaking up and, in some cases, it was highlighted as being a trigger. The working group agreed after a wide consultation that the survey would be re-titled to ‘Speaking up, listening up’ and would refer to harassment of any kind in the workplace and unwanted conduct.