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.

Submit a Promising Practice

Fit & Strong! (USA)

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

Goal: The goal of the Fit and Strong! program is to improve function among older adults with osteoarthritis.

Hawaii Complete Streets Bill (Hawaii)

Filed under Good Idea, Community / Public Safety

Goal: The goal of this legislation is to build a safe and connected transportation systems to serve pedestrians, cyclists, motorists, elderly and disabled residents. This legislation aims to reduce pedestrian and cyclist fatalities.

Head Start & Early Head Start

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Children, Families

Goal: The goal of Early Head Start (EHS) is to promote healthy prenatal outcomes for pregnant women, enhance the development of very young children, and promote healthy family functioning. The goal of Head Start is to increase school readiness of young children in low-income families.

Impact: Studies have demonstrated positive effects of the program for both 3- and 4-year-old children on pre-reading, pre-writing, vocabulary, and parent reports of children’s literacy skills. For 3-year-olds, a greater number of parents reported improved access to health care and better health status.

Healthy Start

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Women

Goal: The initiative's primary purpose was to reduce infant mortality by 50 percent and generally improve maternal and infant health in at-risk communities.

Impact: 20% of the Healthy Start program sites had significantly lower rates of low-birth-weight babies than their comparisons. 20% of the sites also had significantly lower rates of very-low-birth-weight babies than their comparisons. Four of the sites had significantly lower pre-term birth rates.

Helping Early Literacy with Practice Strategies (HELPS) (USA)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Education / Literacy, Children, Urban

Goal: The goal of HELPS Programs is to strengthen students’ reading fluency so they will be better able to focus on and improve other important reading skills, including comprehension.

Impact: HELPS is a supplemental curriculum that improves students reading fluency, a commonly neglected aspect of children's core reading curriculum, in order to help them become successful readers.

Hope Street Family Center- Early Head Start Program (Los Angeles)

Filed under Good Idea, Education / Childcare & Early Childhood Education, Children, Families, Urban

Goal: The program’s goal is to provide comprehensive child development and family support services to families with children 0–3 in order for parents to support and encourage their children’s early growth, development and school readiness.

Hope Street Family Center- Family Literacy Program (Los Angeles)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Literacy, Children, Families

Goal: The program's overall goal is to support parents in their role as their child's first teacher by providing parents with literacy training and children with early development skill building, including language skills.

Impact of Community Health Workers on Use of Healthcare Services in the United States: A Systematic Review

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Other Conditions

Goal: The goal of this study was to determine the effect Community Health Worker programs have on healthcare spending.

Impact: The studies show that CHW programs can help reduce emergency department visits and hospital use.

McNeil Island Corrections Center Family and Fatherhood Program (Tacoma, WA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment

Goal: The goal of this program is to promote positive family relationships, help incarcerated fathers learn skills to be active and involved fathers, encourage incarcerated fathers to
provide financial support for their children, facilitate programs for offender families through community partnerships, and provide constructive opportunities for children to participate in special activities with their incarcerated father.

Meal Delivery Programs Reduce the Use of Costly Health Care in Dually Eligible Medicare And Medicaid Beneficiaries (Massachusetts)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Adults, Older Adults, Urban

Goal: In this study, it was sought to examine whether home delivery of medically tailored meals or non-tailored food reduces the use of selected health care services and medical spending among Commonwealth Care Alliance members. Because there is knowingly an association between food insecurity and emergency room visits, it was hypothesized that the medically tailored meals would cause a reduction in ER visits and other costly healthcare services and expenditures.

Impact: Researchers estimate monthly net savings of $220 per participant for medically tailored meals and $10 per participant for the non-tailored food program. This study suggests that vulnerable patients, in this case, the dually eligible Medicaid and Medicare, can benefit from meal delivery programs.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

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.
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:

The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
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:

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.
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.
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.