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Promising Practices

The Promising Practices database informs professionals and community members about documented approaches to improving community health and quality of life.

The ultimate goal is to support the systematic adoption, implementation, and evaluation of successful programs, practices, and policy changes. The database provides carefully reviewed, documented, and ranked practices that range from good ideas to evidence-based practices.
Learn more about the ranking methodology.

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Strong African American Families (SAAF) (Georgia)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Children, Teens, Families, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Rural

Goal: The SAAF program aims to prevent initiation of risk behaviors such as drug abuse, alcohol and cigarette use, and sexual activity in low-income African American preadolescents.

Impact: This program has helped create positive family interactions and support youth and teens as they take the next steps toward a positive future.

Strong Hearts, Healthy Communities (StrongPeople Healthy Hearts)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults, Adults, Women, Men, Older Adults

Goal: SHHC targets individual, social, and built environment levels of behavior change and is designed to improve diet and physical activity behaviors, assess and improve local food and physical environment resources, and shift social norms about active living and healthy eating through civic engagement and capacity building.

Strong4Life (Georgia)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Teens, Families

Goal: Strong4Life is a statewide movement to inspire kids and families to develop lifelong healthy habits, one positive step at a time.

StrongPeople Strong Bodies

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults, Adults, Women, Men, Older Adults

Goal: StrongPeople Strong Bodies is a community-based strength training program aimed at mid-life and older individuals. The benefits of strength training for older individuals have been studied extensively and include increased muscle mass and strength; improved bone density and reduced risk for osteoporosis and related fractures; reduced risk for diabetes, heart disease, arthritis, depression, and obesity; and improved self-confidence, sleep, and vitality.

Study of Cardiovascular Risk Intervention by Pharmacists (SCRIP) (Canada)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke, Adults

Goal: The goal of SCRIP is to improve cholesterol risk management among patients at risk for coronary heart disease events.

Study to Reduce Intravenous Exposures (STRIVE) (USA)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases, Adults, Urban

Goal: The goal of STRIVE is to reduce risky injection practices among injection drug users with an HCV infection.

Success For All

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children

Goal: The goal of this program is to help all students achieve academic success at the highest levels.

Impact: Results suggest that students in the Success for All schools were achieving at significantly higher levels on three of the four reading outcomes as measured by the Woodcock Reading Mastery Test Revised (WRMT-R).

Supervised Injection Sites (Vancouver, British Columbia)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Urban

Goal: Insite’s mission is to provide a safe environment for people to inject drugs and thus reduce injecting activity in public while linking drug users to health care services such as primary care, addiction counseling and treatment.

Impact: Opening supervised injected facilities have resulted in significant reductions in public injection drug use related issues and increase in referrals to social services and detoxification programs in Vancouver.

Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) Participation and Health Care Expenditures Among Low-Income Adults

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Older Adults

Goal: To determine whether the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which addresses food insecurity, can reduce health care expenditures.

Talking Parents, Healthy Teens (California)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Family Planning, Teens

Goal: The goal of Talking Parents, Healthy Teens is to help parents improve their communication skills with their adolescent children, promote healthy adolescent sexual development, and reduce risky adolescent sexual behaviors.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success and/or promise in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures of improvement in outcome of interest (i.e. increase in voter registration, not just delivery of voter registration drive) and/ or the outcome measure is increased or improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant.

A Good Idea meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
  2. The program evaluation is limited to descriptive measure(s) of success/accomplishment (i.e., program participation rates, number of services/education sessions/radio messages provided). Note: oftentimes, the program has been newly implemented and a program evaluation has not yet been conducted. Programs that have not yet been evaluated, but which show promise in improving health or quality of life, are classified as Good Ideas until an evaluation is conducted.

An Evidence-Based Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. The program description includes at a minimum: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program implementation steps, and outcomes that have demonstrated program success in achieving the program goal in one or more localities.
  2. The results from an evaluation of the program include quantitative measures showing improvement in the outcome(s) of interest after the implementation of the program (i.e. increase in smoking cessation, not just the delivery of a smoking cessation program). The outcome measure(s) is/are compared at relevant time periods before and after the intervention or program implementation. Alternatively, the evaluation study compares the outcome(s) between an intervention group and an appropriate control group.
  3. The study is of peer-review quality and presents numbers in a scientific manner; measurements of precision and reliability are included (e.g. confidence intervals, standard errors), results from statistical tests show a significant difference or change in the outcome measure(s), and relevant point estimates and p-values are presented. Note: if the results from an evaluation of a program are presented in a scientific manner and the outcome measure is improved compared to the baseline measurement or the control group but the difference is not statistically significant, the practice is classified as effective and not evidence-based.