Promising Practices

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Toxins & Contaminants, Rural

Goal: The goal of this study was to address the health effects of PFOA pollution, with a strong desire to implement a community-driven communication strategy to communicate the study results.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Older Adults, Older Adults

Goal: The goal of the Elder Farmers' Market Nutrition Program is to help low-income elders improve their nutrition through access to fresh produce that they may not otherwise be able to afford.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Older Adults

Goal: To provide transportation and improve patient satisfaction for nonemergency medical services.

Impact: CareMore's NEMT was so successful in the first 3 months, the programs were expanded in California, Nevada, Arizona, and Virginia.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Adults, Racial/Ethnic Minorities

Goal: Change The Future WV emphasizes improving access to healthy food options and safe environments for physical activity to create healthier communities in the Mid-Ohio Valley.

Impact: Change The Future WV has launched multiple community and school-based interventions to improve dietary behaviors and physical fitness in the Mid-Ohio Valley.

Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Poverty, Children, Families

Goal: The program's mission is to promote public-private partnerships to ensure that the children of Florida are provided safe, high quality, developmentally appropriate and enriching child care while parents work to remain self-sufficient.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Education / Educational Attainment, Adults

Goal: The goal of this program is to improve outcomes among Community College students who are on academic probation.

Impact: Enhanced Opening Doors helps low-income students earn college credentials as the pathway to better jobs and further education.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Economy / Poverty, Adults, Women, Men, Families, Urban

Goal: The goal of the Family Peer Support program is to increase family economic and social self-sufficiency, and to connect parents to needed physical health, behavior health, and educational resources for their child. Family peer support programs generally focus on fostering encouragement of personal responsibility and self-determination, improving family health and wellness, and supporting engagement and communication with providers and systems of care. Research shows that peer support programs promote empowerment and self-esteem, self-management, engagement and social inclusion, as well as improving the social networks of families who receive these services. Research evidence qualifies peer support services as evidence-based through the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality guidelines.

Salzer MS, Schwenk E, Brusilovskiy E: Certified peer specialist roles and activities: results from a national survey. Psychiatric Services 61:520–523, 2010.
Repper J, Carter T: A review of the literature on peer support in mental health services. Journal of Mental Health 20: 392–411, 2011.
Cook JA: Peer-delivered wellness recovery services: from evidence to widespread implementation. Psychiatric Rehabilitation Journal 35:87–89, 2011

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children

Goal: The goal of the HOPS program was to improve overall health status and academic achievement using replicable strategies.

Impact: The HOPS intervention helped students who qualified for free or reduced price meals both stay within the normal BMI percentile and score higher on their state math achievement test.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Children's Health, Children, Families, Urban

Goal: The goal of Healthy Families Palm Beach is to prevent child abuse and neglect.

Impact: The Healthy Families program improves birth outcomes, nurtures child development, prevents child abuse and neglect, improves family functioning, and help parents develop more positive beliefs in their parental roles.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Teens, Adults, Women, Men, Families, Urban

Goal: Research shows that children benefit from kinship care in many ways. Kinship care can reduce the trauma that children may have previously endured and the trauma that accompanies parental separation by providing them with a sense of stability and belonging in an otherwise unsettling time. Children who have been placed with relatives may have experienced chronic neglect and physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. While these experiences place children at risk for behavioral and health problems, a positive relationship with a caregiver and a stable and supportive living environment can mitigate their impact.1 Grandparents, other relative caregivers, and “fictive kin” — close friends holding a family-like bond with a child — are in a unique position to fill this supportive role and promote resiliency.

The goal of Kinship Connections is to support kin families' social, emotional, and economic needs to increase placement stability within the child’s community. Specific program objectives are to improve family economic security, family relationship functioning, child well-being, and to increase kin caregiver social support.

1Center on the Developing Child. (2007). The impact of early adversity on children’s development (InBrief). Retrieved from https://developingchild.harvard.edu/ resources/inbrief-the-impact-of-early-adversity-onchildrens-development.
2 Generations United. (2017). In loving arms: The protective role of grandparents and other relatives in raising children exposed to trauma. Retrieved from https://dl2.pushbulletusercontent.com/ uhDY7UgdGYnOod6G7VFkdKnuzE3yALmr/17- InLovingArms-Grandfamilies.pdf.