Response to General Optical Council consultation on its sexual boundaries guidance

We welcomed the General Optical Council (GOC) issuing guidance to help registrants understand the standards expected of them in terms of maintaining sexual boundaries and caring for patients in vulnerable circumstances. Helping registrants to understand and meet standards can help to prevent misconduct from occurring. The existence of clear and robust standards also helps give confidence to patients about the care they should expect to receive, and can help patients and other professionals identify where care or conduct falls short.

In our response, we highlighted some areas where the guidance was lacking in clarity, and made suggestions we hope will help make it more effective for public protection - in terms of both guiding registrant behaviour and in providing clarity for fitness to practise decisions.

This is particularly in relation to the nature of relationships that are considered appropriate, and the duty to report in appropriate behaviour directed at a colleague.

We welcome the development of separate guidance specifically addressing the care of patients in vulnerable circumstances, and the recognition within it that vulnerabilities can arise from circumstances, not just personal characteristics, and can change over time. As far as we are aware, the GOC is the only healthcare professional regulator to have specific standalone guidance on this topic.

Read our full response below.