1. Who is an adult at risk?

This module

This is module 2 of 2 (1 hour). Module 1 covered children. Completing both is the PrismCPD safeguarding series. GDC Development Outcomes A, C and D.

Suggested study time

• Adult at risk, law and professional duty — 18 min
• What you might see, including domestic abuse — 20 min
• Capacity, sharing and referral — 17 min
• Knowledge check (MCQ) — 5 min

Care Act 2014 (England — paraphrased)

Adult safeguarding duties apply where an adult has care and support needs, is experiencing or is at risk of abuse or neglect, and as a result of those needs is unable to protect themselves. You do not have to prove all three in the chair. If you are worried, share with the designated lead.

Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland use their own adult support and protection frameworks. Use the definition and referral route that apply where you practise.

Why dentistry sees this

Adults with dementia, learning disability, severe mental illness, frailty, or who depend on a carer for attending, paying or consenting, may not be able to protect themselves. They still have the right to be treated as adults — including the right, if they have capacity, to make unwise decisions.

Types of adult abuse

• Physical, sexual, psychological / emotional
• Financial or material (money, benefits, “the carer holds the card”)
• Neglect and acts of omission
• Discriminatory and organisational (systems that ignore dignity)
• Domestic abuse, including coercive control
• Modern slavery
• Self-neglect (hoarding, untreated disease, refusal of care) — still a safeguarding conversation, handled carefully

CQC and GDC

Registered providers must have a safeguarding system for adults as well as children. GDC Standards still require you to raise concerns if patients are at risk. An adult’s right to autonomy does not mean you ignore a carer who will not let the patient speak.