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, Education / Childcare & Early Childhood Education, Children, Families
Goal: HIPPY programs empower parents as primary educators of their children in the home and foster parent involvement in school and community life to maximize the chances of successful early school experiences.
Impact: Through 20 years of research, the HIPPY model has proven to be effective in improving school readiness, parent involvement in students' academic lives, school attendance, classroom behavior, and overall academic performance.
Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Families
Goal: The goal of this program is to prevent the unnecessary out-of-home placement of children through intensive, on-site intervention, and to teach families new problem-solving skills to prevent future crises.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Public Safety, Older Adults
Goal: The mission of the program is to shape the evolving health system by developing and spreading high-value models of community-based care and self-management for diverse populations with chronic conditions.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens, Racial/Ethnic Minorities
Goal: The goal of the HORIZONS program is to reduce sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), particularly HIV, by increasing condom use and partner communication about safer sex.
Impact: The HORIZONS program empowered African American female adolescents to pursue safer sex and reduced the number of STDs among those in the program.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases, Children, Families, Urban
Goal: The goal of this immunization case management intervention is to improve immunization rates among infants of low-income, urban, African American families.
Impact: Immunization case management increased the knowledge of immunization schedules, rate of well-child visits, and up-to-date immunization rate for children of participating families.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Adults, Older Adults
Goal: The goal of IMPACT is to improve depression treatment by providing collaborative care to older adults.
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.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Physical Activity, Children, Families
Goal: To decrease saturated fat consumption and thus reduce coronary heart disease risk factors in young children.
Impact: STRIP's intervention of diet counseling that began at a child's infancy favorably impacted the child's diet through childhood up to ages 8 or 10, but the goal of 2:1 unsaturated-saturated fatty acid ratio in a child's diet was not met for either intervention or control group.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Women, Urban
Goal: The goal of IT'S TIME is to help women of child-bearing age quit smoking.
Impact: The IT'S TIME program succeeded in helping women quit smoking.
Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Adolescent Health, Teens
Goal: The goal of It's Your Game: Keep It Real is to reduce teen pregnancy, prevent STI transmission, and delay teen sexual activity in middle school students.
Impact: Participants in the It’s Your Game: Keep It Real intervention program were less likely to initiate sex by the ninth grade when compared to the control group.