The mission of dentistry is to provide high-quality services to preserve and promote the oral and dental health of the population [1]. These preventive and therapeutic services should be provided to the highest standards. To achieve these great goals the dentist enters this field as a professional. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay The principles of professional ethics include the commitments that people who practice a profession have to society [1]. Society expects that in all professional decisions a professional will prioritize the health of patients and society over personal benefits, which is the most important way to strengthen public trust [1]. To present dental services with maximum effectiveness, it is necessary that service providers are committed to ethical considerations, which would result in peace of mind and safety for patients and society. Medical ethics is a structured system that aims to provide appropriate strategies for solving ethical challenges in the field of medicine [2]. Ethical objectives and values, formulated as codes of ethics, can be used as a source for dentists' ethical decision-making and performance. The purpose of developing professional codes of ethics for dentists is to provide an ethical standard for the practice of dentists, inform the public of these standards, and achieve professional integrity [3]. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) emphasizes respect for patient dignity in healthcare [4]. The analysis of professional ethical responsibilities reveals a number of irrefutable common ethical principles; for example, there is no doubt about the need for respect, confidentiality and loyalty. While ethical considerations ensure compliance with these general principles, they should be defined exclusively for each profession. In professions where human relationships, whether in the form of a relationship with a patient or with a colleague, are stronger, the exact specification of these principles seems more necessary. An example of such professions is dentistry. Respect for patients' rights is one of the most important professional principles of medical ethics. Dental associations have codified the written expression of the obligations deriving from the implicit contract between the dental profession and society. The most prestigious code is developed by the American Dental Association (ADA) with the title “Ethical Principles and Code of Professional Conduct”. , which is updated annually [5]. The study involves all dentists who are members of this association. The latest version of the ADA codes of ethics (2018) has three main components: “the Ethical Principles, the Code of Professional Conduct and the Advisory Opinions” [5]. One of the most comprehensive ethical guidelines was developed by the General Dental Council (GDC) of England in 2013 [6]. This document regulates the standards of conduct, performance, ethical principles and guidelines that govern dental professionals. It also specifies what patients can expect from dental professionals [6]. The American College of Dentists (ACD) has dedicated the Ethics Manual for Dentists to the dental profession since 2000 and reviews it every four years; This manual is a useful introduction to ethics, professionalism and ethical decision making. It involves ethical issues related to advertising, child abuse, competence and judgment, confidentiality, delegation of duties, social media, disclosure and misrepresentation, financial arrangements,informed consent, to refusal, obligation and abstention from treating patients [7].The Australian Dental Association also has ethical principles for professional behavior and four principles of medical ethics. It also specifies the ethical obligations of dentists towards patients, staff, colleagues and associations[8,9]. Recently, much attention has been paid to the development of the principles of medical ethics in Iran, resulting in the development of general and specific codes of research ethics, comprehensive documentation of the country's pharmaceutical system, code of nursing ethics in Iran, professional standards ethical charter of psychiatry in Iran and patients' bill of rights [10-13]. In 2018, the Medical Council of the Islamic Republic of Iran published general ethical guidelines for healthcare providers and affiliates under 11 headings, including general obligations, standards of high-quality service delivery, priority of patient benefits, justice and impartiality, honor and integrity, respect for autonomy, confidentiality and privacy, management of medical errors, relationship with colleagues, organizational and social responsibilities, dress codes in the clinical environment, medical training and research. The Iranian medical community is required to observe the codes presented in the guidelines; failure to comply may result in judicial proceedings and sanctions [14]. These priorities are also shared in dentistry as a branch of medical sciences; However, due to the differences in the activities of dentists and their relationship with patients compared to medicine, it is imperative to develop ethical considerations specific to dentistry. Dentists must make different decisions due to technological advances in prevention, diagnosis and treatment, as well as changes in economic status and patient expectations. Public publication of ethical considerations will serve as a guide to service providers on how to provide the service. Furthermore, due to Iran's cultural, social, economic and religious differences compared to other countries, some problems in the dentist-patient relationship, such as close and prolonged physical contact with the patient and a higher percentage of out-of-pocket payments, are different from those of other countries. Since the founding of a dental school under the direction of Melczarski in 1930 [15], no attempt has been made to develop ethical codes for dentists despite their necessity. Furthermore, although professional dentists are committed to adhering to generally accepted codes of ethics, few studies have assessed whether dentists implement these principles in practice. The aim of this study was to develop codes of ethics for Iranian general dentists to serve as a preliminary source to provide a tool for evaluating the current ethical status of dentists, to obtain standardized codes, and to improve the professional performance of dentists. METHODS: The present study was conducted at the Dentistry Research Institute of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran, from August 2016 to July 2018. This qualitative study was performed in three phases: Phase one: it A comprehensive and systematic search was conducted using published books, manuscripts and articles as well as Internet databases to retrieve some guidelines and documents most relevant to the "code of conduct" and "code of ethics" in combination with the terms "dentist", "dentistry" and "dentist". Thirty codes of ethics for dental foundations around the world and 56 documents on dental ethics were collected. Their articles were analyzed through a direct content analysis method according to the method proposed by Zhang and Wildemuth which involved eight steps [16] and finally, 196 articles were extracted.