Vassilis Kontogiannis
Introduction
Vassilis Kontogiannis is a former UK dentist, an orthodontist in the Portsmouth area, whose name was erased from the General Dental Council (GDC) register on 21 November 2025, after a Professional Conduct Committee found failings in his care of young orthodontic patients, breaches of infection-control and medical-emergency regulations, and dishonesty in treating a child while suspended from the NHS performers list. The committee found his fitness to practise impaired by misconduct, directed erasure and imposed an immediate order of suspension. Kontogiannis did not attend the hearing and had not engaged with his regulator for over four years.
Background Information
Kontogiannis was registered with the GDC as a dentist, registration number 69201, and ran Dolphin Orthodontics, where the events in the case took place. The GDC first received information from NHS England in May 2019, that conditions imposed on his inclusion on the National Performers List had been varied; they were varied again in May 2020. Information passed to NHS England by Person X, a dental nurse from the practice who became the whistleblower in the case, led to his emergency suspension from the National Performers List on 15 January 2021 and, on 25 January 2021, his suspension from the dental performers’ list for at least six months on patient-safety grounds. Two referrals went to the GDC: the first concerned the care of child patients B and C between 2016 and 2019 and the condition of the practice; the second concerned Patient D, another child, and his conduct towards the GDC investigation. The hearing began on 3 November 2025, with expert evidence from Professor Nigel Hunt.
The Controversy or Incident That Led to Their Cancellation
Adjudicated vs. alleged. The findings against Vassilis Kontogiannis were made by a GDC Professional Conduct Committee on the balance of probabilities, in his absence. They are regulator findings, not criminal convictions, and no criminal allegation is recorded on this page.
In the first referral, the committee found proved that he failed to maintain an adequate standard of care for Patients B and C between December 2016 and November 2018: he did not obtain a medical history from Patient B, did not offer full treatment options to either family before starting orthodontic treatment, and did not obtain informed consent — including from Patient B before giving unexplained local anaesthetic, which made her panic and cry. It found he failed to treat the children with kindness and compassion: he spoke rudely and abruptly to both, and on 18 July 2017, when Patient B was crying, told her to “stop making a fuss” and pushed her back into the chair. The second referral found the same pattern with Patient D: on four dates in 2018–2019 he spoke aggressively to the boy, and on one or more occasions in 2019 hit the side of his head with the palm of his hand to move it into position.
The committee found no cover for emergency care while he was away, and patients booked at ten-minute intervals, leaving too little time to decontaminate the surgery on four dates in 2020–2021. When inspectors arrived on 22 January 2021 they found no patient safety glasses, expired defibrillator pads (June 2019), an expired oxygen cylinder (October 2020), a size 2 airway expired since 2010 with no size 3 present, and an emergency kit containing expired drugs. It also found inadequate autoclave cycles for the 26 patients seen on 30 November 2020, no adequate Covid-19 staff risk assessments, and patient details sent over Viber on staff personal phones. One charge, on booking too many patients to maintain social distancing, was found not proved.
He also failed to cooperate with the GDC’s 2022 investigations, ignoring letters requesting indemnity evidence and patient records, and gave no up-to-date registered address from June 2022 until at least February 2025. Most seriously, it found proved that on or around 2 March 2021 he treated Patient D under the NHS while suspended from the performers list, conduct it found both misleading and dishonest: he knew of the suspension, having been told by letter and telephone in January 2021, and deliberately withheld it from the family, so was “deliberately misrepresenting to Patient D and his mother that he was able to treat patients without any restriction”.
Public Reaction and Consequences
No public or media reaction is recorded in the determination, so the consequences that matter are the committee’s. At stage two it found the proved facts amounted to misconduct: a “pattern of serious misconduct and behaviour” posing a real risk to patient safety and breaching fundamental principles of honesty and integrity, conduct that would be viewed as “deplorable by his fellow practitioners”. It found impairment on public protection and public interest grounds, citing unremediated failings that placed patients and staff at significant risk of harm and a high risk of repetition. Finding no lesser sanction sufficient or workable, the committee concluded his conduct was “fundamentally incompatible with registration” and that erasure alone was proportionate; an immediate order of suspension was imposed pending the erasure taking effect.
Current Status
Kontogiannis is erased from the GDC register. The committee announced its findings of fact on 11 November 2025 and delivered its determination on 12 November 2025, directing erasure and imposing the immediate suspension; the determination was issued on 21 November 2025, the decision date on the published pages. Unless he appeals, the erasure is recorded in the register 28 days from deemed service; if he appeals, the immediate suspension remains in place until the appeal is resolved. No appeal is recorded on the published pages. Erasure means he may no longer practise as a dentist in the United Kingdom.
Impact on Their Career/Life
The erasure ends Kontogiannis’s registration and any lawful practice as a dentist in the United Kingdom, on top of the NHS performers-list suspension imposed in January 2021. Removal is permanent in practical terms: restoration could be sought only through the GDC’s processes, and the committee’s findings — a deep-seated attitudinal problem towards his regulator, no insight or remediation, an ongoing risk of harm — mark the distance between his position and any return. The dishonesty finding carries particular weight: treating a child while suspended, concealed from the child’s mother, was treated as a breach of a fundamental tenet of the profession. The record is otherwise silent about his life beyond the register.