Moral Action and Professionalism

Background As dentistry became a profession it crafted aspirational values to announce the highest standards for the relationship between individual practitioners and those who sought their care and of professional etiquette among colleagues. These standards evolved as dentistry underwent dramatic development in technique, scientific knowledge, commercial ownerships of practice, a shift toward insurance and the government paying for most of the dental bill, and an increasing voice for the public. Dentistry borrowed some of the principles from the bioethics movement in the 1970s and '80s.