Complaints and Licensing Investigations in the UAE: How the Process Works

No single hearing decides whether a UAE health professional is fit to practise. A concern is instead broken into separate questions, and each question belongs to a different body. One clinical episode can therefore be under review in two or three places at once, on different timetables.

Closing one track does not close the others. The Decree-Law keeps disciplinary responsibility in place whatever happens in a criminal case, and Dubai's 2024 resolution lets the DHA apply administrative penalties even after an acquittal. Files can also open without any patient complaint, for example after a referral from a court or a government body, an inspection or an audit of records.

As a rule, the complaint lands with whichever authority licensed the facility where you treated the patient.

• DHA: Dubai as a whole, free zones such as DIFC included, but not federal facilities. Patients complain online at no cost, and the DHA quotes one to six months for its service.
• DOH: the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, covering the capital, Al Ain and Al Dhafra. Patients or their representatives use an online request for a medical-error investigation.
• MOHAP: federal facilities in every emirate and private providers in the four Northern Emirates outside Sharjah. Its complaints service sorts cases into administrative and medical.
• SHA: Sharjah's government health establishments, its private facilities and its free zones, under the Executive Council decision of July 2025 (Resolution No. 29 of 2025). Federal facilities in Sharjah fall outside it.
• DHCR: the Dubai Healthcare City free zone. Dubai Law No. 16 of 2024 brings activity there under DHA licences and permits, while the older DHCC regulations continue until new ones take their place.

Where the map is still settling, as in Sharjah and DHCC, get written confirmation of the body handling your case before you send anything. Emirates Health Services, which operates federal hospitals and clinics, employs staff but does not license them.

Cases do not move at a fixed speed, but most pass through the same phases. Knowing which one you are in helps you judge what to do next and how much time you have.

A precautionary suspension can arrive during phases 2 to 4 if patient safety is at stake. Phases 4 and 5 can overlap, and an employer review may run alongside the whole sequence.

The liability law is federal, so a suspected error goes before a Medical Liability Committee in every emirate. MOHAP, the DHA and the DOH each appoint committees made up of experienced doctors from different specialties.

1. Referral. Cases reach the committee from the health authority, and courts and prosecutors must send medical-error matters there too. No compensation claim for medical liability can proceed until a committee has looked at it.
2. The record. The Rapporteur collects the original medical file, so what you wrote at the time becomes your main evidence.
3. Hearing the parties. You, the complainant and any witnesses are invited to give your accounts. If a member has a family link to either side, reports to one of the parties, previously treated the patient for the same problem or advised you on the case, object in writing.
4. The report. The law expects a reasoned report within 30 days of referral, with extensions possible; real cases frequently take several months.
5. The gross-error threshold. A finding of gross error needs a two-thirds vote of members present, and the report has to identify the criterion behind it.
6. Challenge. You and the complainant each have 30 days from formal notice of the report to lodge a grievance. It goes through the health authority to the Supreme Committee of Medical Liability, which may confirm, change or set aside the report, and whose decision the law describes as final.
7. Missed deadline. An unchallenged report becomes final and no other body can reopen it.

Abu Dhabi has its own online route for this challenge: either side can file within 30 days of receiving the report, the fee is AED 5,000, and the Higher Medical Liability Committee at MOHAP decides, with no fixed time frame.

Under Article 6, an error exists where it comes from one of four sources: not knowing what a practitioner of your grade and specialty should know, departing from accepted professional standards, failing to take due care, or negligence. You are measured against a peer at your own level, not against the leading expert in the field.

Gross error is narrower. It requires serious harm, such as death or the loss of an organ or its function, combined with an aggravating feature: ignorance of well-settled standards that cannot be excused, a method medicine does not accept, working while impaired by alcohol or drugs, gross negligence, or knowingly going beyond your specialty or privileges.

• When there is no liability: the harm had another cause, including the patient's own actions; you chose a different approach that still meets accepted standards; or a known or unforeseen complication happened without any error.
• When criminal law comes in: only for gross error. Prosecutors may not open an investigation into, arrest or hold a practitioner over an error unless a final health authority report has classed it as gross.

Executive Council Resolution No. 49 of 2024, which replaced Dubai's 2012 rules, governs discipline for every professional the DHA licenses. When a Medical Liability Committee reaches a decision, the DHA sends it on, together with the original complaint, to the Medical Practices Committee.

• Penalties: a written warning, downgrading, suspension for up to a year or revocation, and fines between AED 2,000 and AED 100,000.
• Measures: attending named training within a deadline, working under another professional's supervision for up to twelve months, and being reassessed.
• No fixed order: the committee can choose any penalty or measure first, so a suspension is possible without a prior warning.
• Precautionary suspension: up to three months while the investigation is completed, with one further period allowed if reasons are given. The Medical Grievances Committee may pause it where there are substantial grounds, deciding within three working days.
• Challenging a DHA decision: a written grievance to the Director General within 30 days of notice. The Medical Grievances Committee rules within 30 days and its ruling is final.

Two further DHA documents shape these cases: the Fitness to Practice Policy (2025), whose areas of concern include dishonesty, substance misuse, breaches of confidentiality and working outside scope, and the Code of Ethics standards in force since September 2025. The DHA remediation courses page lines courses up against the Dubai process.

Across Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and Al Dhafra, the DOH uses its own founding law, Abu Dhabi Law No. 10 of 2018, together with the federal laws for each profession. The DOH warns patients that a medical-error investigation can run for months.

• Penalties under the Abu Dhabi law run from a notice or warning, through financial, administrative or technical supervision and suspension of activity, to suspending or cancelling a licence, closing a facility and fines.
• Time to challenge: 60 days for a DOH administrative penalty, which the DOH then has 90 days to decide; where a federal profession law is applied, the grievance window is 15 days.
• Incident reports follow a separate standard built around learning: staff log incidents in the facility system within 24 hours, and facilities must have a way of telling patients and families about safety events.
• Precautionary steps: the DOH can suspend professionals while it investigates or refers a case, and it will not renew a licence that is under suspension.

Insurance claims and certificates issued without a proper examination have featured in DOH enforcement, which makes accurate documentation a theme worth taking seriously. See DOH remediation courses.

MOHAP deals with complaints about federal facilities and about private providers and their staff in Ajman, Umm Al Quwain, Ras Al Khaimah and Fujairah. It handles two kinds of complaint differently. Administrative matters are put to the facility first and may lead to an inspection and a referral to the Health Practices Control Committee. Alleged medical errors go to the Medical Liability Committee, and its report is passed to the Medical Licensing Committee to decide what action to take.

Discipline follows the federal profession laws. You must be given the chance to state your side and defend yourself before any penalty, but staying away without a good reason will not hold up the decision.

Pharmacists are licensed under Federal Decree-Law No. 38 of 2024, so ask which disciplinary provisions are being applied to you. See MOHAP remediation courses.

Sharjah. In July 2025 the Sharjah Executive Council issued a decision (Resolution No. 29 of 2025) that brings the emirate's government health establishments, private providers and free-zone facilities under the SHA, leaving federal facilities out. The decision sets up committees for accountability, medical practice and grievances and includes administrative penalties. The working procedure has not been published in detail, so read the notice closely, ask the SHA in writing which rules it is applying and diary any deadline it gives. See SHA remediation courses.

Dubai Healthcare City. The DHCC Healthcare Professionals Regulation No. 2 of 2013 draws a line between misconduct, meaning improper behaviour that affects the care you provide, and practice that falls short of the required competence. It sets up a Fitness to Practice Panel; available sanctions include conditions, suspension, revocation and competence programmes. Because Dubai Law No. 16 of 2024 moves DHCC licensing to the DHA, check which body has your case.

An interim suspension exists to protect patients while the facts are checked. It says nothing about the outcome, yet it takes you off the rota, so get advice on the day it arrives.

• Federal power: up to 30 days, renewable, pending a liability report or the investigation of other violations.
• Dubai: up to three months plus one extension; the DHA licensing manual also allows a precautionary suspension where patient safety is at risk, where verification of your documents shows a discrepancy, or where another regulator has acted against you.

An open case also shows up when you apply elsewhere. Any new licence application needs proof of good standing dated within six months under the national qualification requirements. While a DHA investigation or appeal is running, the DHA will only issue what it calls a Current Status Certificate, and the DOH lists current investigations on the certificate it issues. Changing emirate does not leave the matter behind.

Getting back after revocation depends on who you are. A physician can be licensed again federally once the reasons for revocation have gone, and after a suspension of between three and twelve months the authority may test competence again or limit privileges. Nurses, midwives and allied health staff can face conditions on return such as compulsory training, reassessment, a narrower scope or supervision. A revoked Dubai licence cannot be reissued for two years, and then only after Medical Practices Committee review and at the title held before.

Every period below is counted from the day you were notified. Keep written proof of that date and set a reminder a week before the last day.

Whether to challenge is a question for your insurer or lawyer, and start that conversation early: the period does not pause while you think it over.

There are two routes by which learning becomes part of a case. Sometimes an authority requires it, as the DHA Medical Practices Committee is able to; then the decision itself sets the requirement, and the authority alone can confirm that a course satisfies it. More often you decide to study on your own initiative, to get to grips with the standard that was questioned and to demonstrate change.

• During an open case, a well-chosen course shows that you are taking the concern seriously, and a written response built from the record, answering each point in the order raised, is often the most useful thing you can give the committee.
• Once a finding is made, a reflective account and a dated plan for change support your position on measures or on returning to work.
• Under supervision or ahead of reassessment, learning linked to the concern gives the supervisor and the authority something specific to review.

Reflecting on events is not an admission of legal liability, but the two can be confused, so have your adviser read any statement first. A course can help you show insight and change; the committee still makes the decision. Your licensing authority decides how any learning counts towards your CPD or a requirement it has set.

Being precise about what learning is for lets you put your effort where it counts, and stops you expecting a certificate to carry weight it cannot.

The left-hand column is where our courses do their work. The right-hand column is where you need your insurer, a UAE lawyer, your facility's medico-legal lead or the authority itself. Knowing the difference is part of showing good judgement.

For the law, penalty scale and usual concerns in your own field, with a course set chosen for it, open your profession page:

• Doctors
• Nurses and midwives
• Dentists
• Pharmacists
• Allied health professionals

To choose by authority or by type of concern instead, use the remediation courses page.