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.
Filed under Good Idea, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Teens
Goal: The mission is to provide a multi-disciplinary program that prepares students for 21st century careers by giving them community based involvement. The hope of this project is for the students to connect content knowledge, acquired skills, and work habits to real world situations and issues.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Women, Urban
Goal: The program has three primary goals:
1) to improve pregnancy outcomes by promoting health-related behaviors;
2) to improve child health, development and safety by promoting competent care-giving; and
3) to enhance parent life-course development by promoting pregnancy planning, educational achievement, and employment.
The program also has two secondary goals: to enhance families' material support by providing links with needed health and social services, and to promote supportive relationships among family and friends.
Impact: The Nurse Family Partnership Program has shown to improve pregnancy outcomes, improve child health and development, and increase economic self-sufficiency.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Women
Goal: The program has three primary goals:
1) to improve pregnancy outcomes by promoting health-related behaviors;
2) to improve child health, development and safety by promoting competent care-giving; and
3) to enhance parent life-course development by promoting pregnancy planning, educational achievement, and employment.
The program also has two secondary goals: to enhance families’ material support by providing links with needed health and social services, and to promote supportive relationships among family and friends.
Impact: Evaluations of the program have shown that women who were visited by nurses had significantly better outcomes than those who did not in terms of measures such as maternal health, maternal life-course development, child health and safety, and adolescent measures of delinquency.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Children's Health, Children
Goal: NAP SACC aims to improve policies, practices, and environments in childcare through better nutrition, increased exercise, and staff-child interactions.
Impact: Intervention centers are more likely to make significant changes in nutrition policies, environments, and practices. The intervention has been replicated in other states to help improve nutrition and physical activity policies and practices.
Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Domestic Violence & Abuse, Families
Goal: The goal of the On-Call Services program is to provide information about domestic violence and the legal system to survivors of abuse. The program also offers legal advocacy for court hearings and meetings with the police, prosecutor, and other involved attorneys, probation, and others.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Economy / Poverty, Families, Urban
Goal: The goal of this program was to help poor families build up their “human capital” and avoid long-term poverty.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Health Care Access & Quality
Goal: The Goal of this Promising Practice is to determine whether a tailored community health worker (CHW) intervention would improve post-hospital outcomes among low-SES patients.
Impact: This intervention would improve access to primary care and quality of discharge while controlling recurrent readmissions in a high-risk population. Health systems may leverage the CHW workforce to improve post-hospital outcomes by addressing behavioral and socioeconomic drivers of disease.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Cancer, Adults, Rural
Goal: The goal of this program is to improve communication between providers and patients about colorectal cancer screening.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens, Urban
Goal: The goal of the PATH Program is to improve knowledge of cardiovascular health and reduce risk factors associated with cardiovascular disease.
Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Older Adults, Older Adults
Goal: PACE provides comprehensive medical and social services to certain frail, elderly people (participants) still living in the community. Most of the participants who are in PACE are dually eligible for both Medicare and Medicaid.
Impact: Key research findings demonstrate PACE effectiveness in delivering gold-standard care for older adults and its approach can be a model for others looking to improve the health care system.