Malpractice is defined as

• A. Duty
• B. Failure by a health professional to meet accepted standards
• C. Injury
• D. Proximate cause

Answer: (B)

Malpractice is professional negligence: a health professional failing to meet the accepted standard of care. In dentistry, this means the clinician did not act as a reasonably competent practitioner would under similar circumstances, and that failure caused harm to the patient. For a malpractice claim, four elements are typically involved: a duty to the patient, a breach of that duty by not meeting the standard of care, causation linking the breach to the injury, and actual damages. Among the options, the statement that describes failing to meet accepted standards best defines malpractice. The other terms point to parts of a claim or to the outcome (duty, injury, causation) but do not alone define malpractice.