A decade of healthcare improvement in cystic fibrosis: lessons for other chronic diseases.

To cite: Stevens DP, Marshall BC. BMJ Qual Saf 2014;23:i1–i2. From 2002 to 2012, the median predicted survival age for people with cystic fibrosis (CF) increased nearly 10 years— from 31.3 years to 41.1 years. 2 Strategic efforts to improve care for CF marked this remarkable era. These efforts were supported by expert leadership among CF healthcare improvement professionals and resources from the CF Foundation. While process outcomes improved substantially—for example, more timely clinic visits, increased influenza immunisation rates, and more effective screening for associated problems such as depression and diabetes, 2 clinical outcomes improved even more dramatically— notably, pulmonary function, nutritional status and predicted survival. This supplement, Ten Years of Improvement Innovation in Cystic Fibrosis Care, captures the larger perspective of this comprehensive improvement initiative and reports representative CF care centre-level examples. It also identifies strategies to widen the circle of improvement professionals who successfully publish their innovative work in scholarly journals.