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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.

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Preventive Nutrition Cardiovascular Disease Program (Dade County, FL)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Physical Activity, Older Adults, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban

Goal: The goals of this project are:
- to increase knowledge of nutrition among Hispanic elders who are at risk for cardiovascular disease and obesity;
- to foster behavior change through group sessions and interactive activities; and
- to test whether the American Heart Association guidelines and materials can be utilized in a dietitian led model targeted to Hispanic elders.

Prime Time Palm Beach County (Palm Beach, FL)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Social Environment, Children, Urban

Goal: The goal of Prime Time Palm Beach County is to improve the quality of school-age afterschool programs through assessment, guidance, and support.

Impact: Based on the 2009 study findings, Prime Time's Quality Improvement System resulted in improvements made to afterschool programs which enhanced quality programming and important developmental learning experiences for youth.

Project ALERT

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens

Goal: The main goals of the program are to prevent adolescent non-users from experimenting with drugs and to prevent youths who are already experimenting from becoming more regular users.

Impact: Project Alert participants were 30% less likely than other students to begin using marijuana and analyses showed that the program significantly dampened pro-drug beliefs about cigarette and marijuana use.

Project BOOST (Building Options and Opportunities for Students) (New York)

Filed under Good Idea, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Teens, Urban

Goal: The goal of the program is to provide students with opportunities that will help them gain admission to high-achieving high schools.

Project BRAVE (New Orleans)

Filed under Good Idea, Community / Crime & Crime Prevention, Teens

Goal: To reduce violence among adolescents and young adults living in neighborhoods with high rates of poverty and violence in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Project EX

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens

Goal: The goal of this program is to reduce or stop smoking among adolescents.

Impact: At 3-month follow-up, 17% of youths in the treatment conditions reported having quit smoking for at least 30 days, compared with only 8% of those teens in the control condition. These positive effects were also demonstrated when moved from a clinic setting to the classroom, as students in the program condition experienced a greater reduction in weekly smoking and monthly smoking, at 6-and-12-month follow-ups.

Project Graduation Really Achieves Dreams (GRAD) (USA)

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

Goal: The mission of Project GRAD is to provide quality public school education for at-risk children in low-income communities and to increase high school and college graduation rates among these populations.

Project Health Education Awareness Research Team (HEART) (El Paso, TX)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke, Adults, Women, Men, Racial/Ethnic Minorities, Urban

Goal: The objective of Project HEART (Health Education Awareness Research Team) was to promote behavior changes to decrease cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors in a high-risk Hispanic border population.

Project Link (Providence, RI)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Women

Goal: The goal of this program is to improve health outcomes for pregnant and postpartum women with substance abuse problems and their infants.

Impact: Improvement in birth weight and gestational age, and reduction in admittance to neonatal intensive care unit and positive infant toxicology screens.

Project SUCCESS (USA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Teens

Goal: The goal of Project SUCCESS is to prevent and reduce substance abuse in high-risk middle-school and high-school aged adolescents.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

  1. 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.
  2. 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:

  1. The program description includes: the sponsoring organization, program goals, program funding source, program implementation steps and outcomes.
  2. 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:

  1. 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.
  2. 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.
  3. 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.