Introduction

What is Duty of Candour?

At its most basic, duty of candour is an ethical obligation to be honest with patients when things go wrong. Adding further depth to that – it’s about being transparent and forthcoming about mistakes, ensuring patients are fully informed. And finally, for those subject matter experts among you, it’s about upholding the integrity of healthcare by fostering a culture of openness that supports patient safety and quality improvement.

The General Optical Council (GOC), the regulatory body of optometrists and dispensing opticians in the UK, hold the duty of candour as a significant topic in their regulations. As such they have provided their own guidance on the professional duty of candour – and this serves as essential additional reading to this post.

Why You Should Care About Duty of Candour

You may think that duty of candour is either just another rule that optometrists and healthcare professionals have to follow, or that it is just basic human decency to own up to your mistakes and as such it isn’t a big deal. However, I am here to give you some compelling reasons as to why you should integrate it into your professional practice.

Reason 1 – It Builds Patient Trust

Reason 2 – It Contributes to Ethical Culture Within Healthcare

Duty of candour is vital for an ethical healthcare culture. It ensures accountability and promotes learning from mistakes. Embracing this duty demonstrates a commitment to ethical standards and patient safety. Furthermore, this promotes honesty and openness to a wider audience, helping others remain candid to their mistakes.

Reason 3 – It Aligns to Professional Standards

Duty of Candour aligns with standards and legalities, ensuring practices meet GOC guidelines. It’s a cornerstone for lawful and ethical optometry, reinforcing professional responsibility. Regardless of your views on being ethical, you are expected to adhere to these guidelines and will experience consequences for being deceitful.

It is important to remember that you are not immune from making mistakes just because you are a qualified (and even experienced) optometrist or dispensing optician. The sad truth of being human is that even the best of us can make mistakes, but how you handle them can be how it defines you as a professional.

Duty of Candour in Context

How duty of candour affects your practice is just as important as understanding what exactly it is and why it’s essential. Lets look at a couple of real-world examples:

• An optometrist realises that a wrong prescription was given. Instead of covering it up, they inform the patient, apologise, and take immediate steps to correct the error. This approach not only resolves the issue but also strengthens the patient’s trust.

• An optometrist performing Goldmann applanation tonometry causes significant staining to the patient’s corneal epipthelium during tonometry. Instead of not addressing what has happened, the optometrist should inform them of the injury, the extent, the implications and how they will manage this to resolution (e.g. ocular lubricant and review)

• A dispensing optician accidentally orders single vision near glasses using the patient’s distance pupillary distance. This mistake is only noted when checking the orders and now requires them to be sent back to be re-made with the correct pupillary distance. The patient should be informed of what has happened, that there will be a delay before they can be collect them and an apology made for the delay.

Duty of Candour: Tips For Professionals

If you are still unsure how duty of candour applies to you and your practice, here are several tips that will help you integrate this duty into your day to day practice.

Tip 1: Always Communicate Openly

Tip 2: Always Document Incidents and Discussions

You should consistently document everything that has been said and done as part of your regular record-keeping process. Even in the event of an error or a negative outcome from a patient interaction, it is essential to continue this practice. Document the sequence of events, actions taken or expected, and any discussions held with the patient. Maintaining these records can be beneficial if a patient decides to file a complaint or pursue legal action concerning the incident. Contemporary, factual documentation (i.e. recorded at the time of occurrence) can serve as evidence in your defense.

Tip 3: Use the GOC Resources on Duty of Candour

As mentioned above, the General Optical Council have prepared guidance on the Duty of Candour on their website. I strongly urge any optometrist and dispensing optician that hasn’t read the guidance to do so as a priority. It is vital that we all work as a team to build a profession of honesty, integrity and trust which will not only serve our patients well, but also help us advocate for optometry as a profession.

Duty of Candour: A Summary

The key takeaways from this post are to remember to always be honest, transparent and maintain integrity as an eye care professional. Be open with your communication with patients, staff and colleagues.

Here at The Eye Care Advocate, it has been my mission to ensure patients and practitioners feel heard, respected and valued. If you would like to know more, please comment below or make contact with me through the contact page. I value the feedback left by all that read and engage with these articles.

Have you any experiences where the duty of candour has come in to play in your role? Feel free to share them in the comments below! Enjoy these posts? Please consider networking with me on LinkedIn, subscribing below or Buying Me a Coffee – all support benefits the ongoing work happening at The Eye Care Advocate.