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 Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Teens, Urban
Goal: To decrease consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages in Boston public schools.
Impact: Data from Boston youth indicated that policy changes restricting the sale of sugar-sweetened beverages in schools can cause significant reductions in consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages and are promising strategies to reduce adolescents’ intake of unnecessary calories.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children
Goal: The goal of this program is to improve the educational performance of economically disadvantaged adolescents.
Impact: After 30 months, program youths reported significantly greater enjoyment and engagement in reading, verbal skills, writing, and tutoring. They also had better overall averages in reading, spelling, history, science, social studies, and school attendance compared with comparison and control youths.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Children, Teens
Goal: The aims of the BASICS program are 1) to reduce alcohol consumption and its adverse consequences, 2) to promote healthier choices among young adults, and 3) to provide important information and coping skills for risk reduction.
Impact: Students who received a brief individual preventive intervention had significantly greater reductions in negative consequences that persisted over a 4-year period than their control-group counterparts. For those individuals receiving the brief intervention, dependence symptoms were more likely to decrease and less likely to increase.
Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Housing & Homes, Urban
Goal: The mission of this project is to improve the safety and living conditions for residents of Boyle Heights and to empower those residents to make positive changes in their communitites and their lives.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Prevention & Safety, Adults, Rural
Goal: The goal of the Cardiovascular Risk Management by Community Pharmacists program is to reduce cardiovascular risk factors through pharmacist provided case management.
CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Breast Cancer Prevention & Control, Provider-Oriented Screening Interventions: Provider Reminder & Recall Systems (USA)
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Cancer, Adults
Goal: The goal of incorporating multicomponent interventions for cancer screenings is to increase breast cancer screenings in communities.
Impact: Multicomponent interventions that include strategies that reduce and address structural barriers increase cancer screening rates by the largest margins.
CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Environmental and Policy Approaches to Increase Physical Activity: Community-Scale Urban Design Land Use Policies (USA)
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Teens, Adults, Women, Men, Older Adults, Families, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Impact: Design and land use policies that encourage physical activity in urban areas can help increase overall physical activity in bikers and walkers.
CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Preventing Excessive Alcohol Consumption: Maintaining Limits on Hours of Sale (USA)
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Adults
Impact: The Community Preventive Services Task Force recommends limiting access to alcohol by regulating the hours it can be sold as they found that increasing the hours available for alcohol sale can result in an increase in alcohol consumption and alcohol-related motor vehicle crashes.
CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Promoting Health Equity, Education Programs and Policies: Full-Day Kindergarten (USA)
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Children's Health, Children
Goal: Children in low-income families often experience delays in language and other development by the age of three. Compensating for these delays before children begin regular schooling can be critical to providing them with equal opportunities for lifelong employment, income, and health.
Impact: Outcomes included self-confidence, ability to work or play with others, independence, and school attendance by the end of kindergarten or the beginning of first grade.
Filed under Good Idea, Health / Alternative Medicine, Women, Urban
Goal: CMCC’s mission is to ensure more equitable access to the full range of evidence-based cancer treatments, programs and resources that could potentially benefit individuals diagnosed with cancer, allowing the women who come to our clinics to make informed choices about their health care and their lives.