There are several methodologies complementary to practice development that seem to be in the ascendant, growing in popularity and in use across different areas of healthcare. It’s prompted me to ask a few questions; for example, how is practice development reviewing its position within or alongside these new approaches? And more broadly, how is practice development moving forward in terms of generating new ideas and theory, and in its implementation? With these questions in mind, I am growing increasingly concerned that the nine principles of practice development (Manley et al., 2008) are due for an update or refresh. What is the responsibility of us all as practice developers – including the International Practice Development Collaborative – when it comes to refreshing and evolving the knowledge base underpinning the ‘PD’ approach? I strongly feel the time is right for a review of where practice development is currently at in terms of theory and methodology or methodologies. Further, given the increasing recognition of person-centredness in many fields of practice and its growing presence in health policy internationally, practice development needs to explore how overtly its ultimate purpose is about creating and nurturing person-centredness and its related outcomes. Otherwise, it is in danger of becoming just another service improvement approach.

At the Enhancing Practice 2018 Conference in Basel, on 22-24 August, the IPDJ team and editorial board members will be on the lookout for presenters with new ideas about practice development to contribute to the journal. If you think you’ve something fresh to offer, get in touch with us via the journal’s homepage, or come and chat at the conference about your writing and publication ideas. Meanwhile, we hope the eclectic range of articles in this issue will inspire you to write, to cite and to share the work of others.

Full details of the conference can be found at enhancing-practice-conference.org/ and you can follow developments in the run-up to the event on Twitter @epc2018.

This article by Jan Dewing is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial 3.0 License.