Communities of Practice in Health and Social Care highlights how communities of practice (CoPs) can make service development and quality improvement in health and social care easier to initiate and more sustainable.

Using a series of case studies from the UK and Canada the book demonstrates how the theory of CoPs is implemented in the delivery of health and social care and highlights the associated potential, complexities, advantages and disadvantages.

Communities of Practice in Health and Social Care equips practitioners, managers, educators and practice mentors with the knowledge and skills to facilitate the development and maintenance of Communities of Practice and highlights how the effects of Communities of Practice might be made explicit.

Andrée le May is Professor in the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Southampton University. She has written, researched and taught widely on Communities of Practice, Evidence-Based Practice and Knowledge Transfer. In addition she is an experienced author and teacher.