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Why choose the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Education
A ground-breaking PgCert offering the only university-accredited law and ethics course specifically for dental professionals.
Taught by an interdisciplinary team of university academics and visiting experts with wide-ranging legal and ethical expertise.
Our healthcare courses (‘Allied to Medicine’) rank 11th overall in their subject field in the Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey 2024; they rank 2nd for engagement, with top 10 rankings for learning community, assessment and organisation.
About the course
This flexible, part-time course provides a unique opportunity to study dental care from ethical, legal and professional perspectives. It builds your professional knowledge of the concepts and theories of law and ethics, and how they are applied in practice. Encompassing both clinical and business settings, it provides the opportunity to examine your own practice, particularly in relation to enhancing patient care and delivering excellent service.
To take this course, you must have a relevant qualification in the field and be working in the profession.
The course fees are £3,336 for 25/26 (2 units, 60 credits).
Facilities and specialist equipment
- 24/7 access to our library services with 194,000 e-books and 192,000 e-journals
- Guided learning materials and e-learning resources on the University’s virtual learning platform
Your student experience
The course combines eight study days with online and self-directed learning.
Study the ethical challenges and dilemmas that occur in dental practice; propose possible responses; and support these with well-argued rationales.
Deliver tutor-supported assessment tasks tailored to allow you to deal with the real issues you encounter in your professional life.
Develop the ability to appraise your own approach to practice using independent or collaborative methods to identify and respond to your needs.
Benefit from a wide range of learning and teaching methods including small-group workshops; micro-teaching; case studies; critical-incident analysis; and action learning sets.
Our academic team are research active and have published widely in their fields, in journals including the British Dental Journal.
Benefit from being at a University with a successful track record of supporting those returning to study after long periods in the workplace or after a career break.
Our Bedford campus is a small, thriving academic community where academic staff get to know you well.
Course schedule
The PgCert Dental Law and Ethics includes 2 units, over two semesters.*
| Date | Location | Time |
| Wednesday, 24/9/2025 | Bedford campus | 10:00 - 4:00 |
| Thursday, 9/10/2025 | Online | 10:00 - 1:00 |
| Wednesday, 5/11/2025 | Bedford campus | 10:00 - 4:00 |
| Thursday, 27/11/2025 | Online | 10:00 - 1:00 |
| Date | Location | Time |
| Thursday, 22/1/2026 | Bedford campus | 10:00 - 4:00 |
| Wednesday, 11/2/2026 | Online | 10:00 - 1:00 |
| Wednesday, 4/3/2026 | Bedford campus | 10:00 - 4:00 |
| Friday, 27/3/2026 | Online | 10:00 - 1:00 |
*All units are core, face to face contact takes place at Bedford campus, exact teaching rooms will be communicated via our online system (BREO) – dates may be subject to minor changes
Get in touch
For more information please contact the course lead Dr Hoda Wassif via email hoda.wassif@beds.ac.uk
Course Leader - Dr Hoda Wassif - Associate Professor in Medical & Dental Education
I am a Principal Lecturer in Medical & Dental Education and Portfolio Lead Pre-Professional & Continuing Health Education Portfolio, part of the School of Nursing and Health Education.
As portfolio lead, I offer academic leadership and support related to a range of courses in Pre-Professional and Continuing Health Education including; Advanced Nursing Practice, Nursing Associates, short courses in health systems as well as Medical & Dental Education.
What will you study?
Studying our Dental Law and Ethics PgCert course will equip you with the basic and fundamental concepts as well as the contemporary and practical applications of legal and ethical knowledge relevant to dental care and practice. Our Dental Law in Practice unit will introduce you to aspects of law related to dental care and practice while enabling you to adopt a critical, analytical and reflective approach. Moreover, you will develop an awareness of the risks associated with legal issues and learn how this can be managed in a dental team. With a similar approach, our unit in Ethical Dental Practice will develop your knowledge of ethical issues in the provision of high-quality dental care. Furthermore, you will explore these ethical dilemmas in more depth to understand how it impacts patient care.
How will you be assessed?
This course has been designed as a blended learning course combining face-to-face learning (during study contact days) with supported interactive on-line learning.
In addition the course requires students to make explicit links between their learning on the course and their own individual practice. This is primarily through the assessment strategy and by allowing students the flexibility in selecting their topics for assessment tasks.
Students also have the chance to reinforce their knowledge by linking the legal and ethical theory into their practice through developing an artefact that emerges from their chosen topics. Teaching learning and assessment activities across the course are designed to enable students to rehearse and hone skills required for their assessment tasks.
For example working in groups to study reported cases in the media and legal and ethical cases from the GDC help students in their selection and later in their analysis of legal case law and their links to dental practice.
The assessments for the course has been developed to ensure that:
- You are able to demonstrate achievement of course learning outcomes at masters’ level
- There is alignment to learning and teaching methods
- Assessments are relevant to your workplace based practices
- You are supported to develop relevant workplace related skills operating in a legal and ethical framework
Careers
This course is designed to develop the skills and practices of dental care professionals with an interest in legal and ethical dental practice. You can enhance your legal role in dental practice (such as practice managers or clinical leads); indemnity organisations; primary care organisations; or acting as an expert witness to legal firms.
