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Care and service improvement requires the ability to make successful local change, then to transfer this for implementation in other departments and services, or across a whole organisation or sector. However, research shows that highly institutionalised and complex healthcare systems find the spread of transformation difficult, being naturally slow to adapt, innovate, and improve. Change therefore usually happens incrementally and inconsistently, with successful innovation resembling a journey rather than a single event. This is characterised by processes of adoption, implementation, sustaining, spreading, and scaling up.

There are certain areas an improvement team needs to consider to ensure the long-term sustainability of an improvement effort. Use this worksheet to help plan for success before you achieve the improvement you want to sustain, to make sure your hard-won improvements stick.

Quality improvement involves the use of a systematic and coordinated approach to solving a problem using specific methods and tools with the aim of bringing about measurable improvement within a healthcare setting.