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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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Parent-Child Home Program (USA)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Education / Childcare & Early Childhood Education, Children, Families

Goal: To prepare children of disadvantaged families for academic success and to strengthen families through intensive home visiting.

Impact: When families are engaged in facilitated discussion, the participating families tend to talk more, read more, and have more positive interactions with their children. They engage in more educational activities at home and in their communities.

Parenting Wisely (Ohio)

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

Goal: The goal of this program is to reduce child behavior problems and delinquency and substance abuse among adolescents, to improve parenting knowledge and skills, and to strengthen the relationship between adolescent and parent.

Impact: Findings from studies show an association between Parenting Wisely participation and improvements in family problem solving, family roles, family involvement, parenting self-efficacy, parenting sense of competence, and decreased adolescent violent behavior.

Partnership for Health (California)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases

Goal: The goal of Partnership for Health is to reach HIV positive patients during regular doctor visits and increase their knowledge, skills, and motivations to practice safer sex.

Impact: Brief provider counseling emphasizing the negative consequences of unsafe sex can reduce HIV transmission behaviors in HIV-positive patients presenting with risky behavioral profiles.

Partnerships That Work: National Service and Business in Welfare to Work (USA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Employment, Teens, Families

Goal: This study addresses how to use national service to build effective welfare-to-work programs, and to encourage business collaborations. Two major suggestions are partnering with Employer Advisory Groups and generating national level support.

Pasadena Community Asthma Program (PCAP) (Pasadena)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Respiratory Diseases, Children, Families

Goal: The program’s goal is to help families prevent and/or successfully manage asthma.

Pathways to Housing, Inc. (NYC, DC, Philadelphia)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Economy / Housing & Homes, Adults, Urban

Goal: The goal of Pathways to Housing, Inc. is to provide independent housing, treatment services for physical and mental health, and employment to mentally ill individuals who are chronically homeless.

Impact: Pathways to Housing has received numerous awards for its projects in New York City, Philadelphia, and D.C. In addition to achieving large effects in terms of housing outcomes, compared with standard care in the community, Housing First also improves community functioning and quality of life.

Patient and Physician Reminders to Promote Colorectal Cancer Screening (Massachusetts)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Cancer, Adults, Older Adults

Goal: The goal of this program is to increase colorectal cancer screening rates among older primary care patients.

Pediatric Weight Control Program (Palo Alto)

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Children's Health

Goal: The goals of the Packard Pediatric Weight Control Program are to (1) help children improve their eating and exercise habits; (2) create a balanced diet; and (3) help participating children maintain or gradually lose weight.

Peers Reaching Out and Modeling Intervention Strategies (PROMISE) (Texas, Colorado, California, New York, Washington)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Immunizations & Infectious Diseases, Urban

Goal: The goal of Community PROMISE is to encourage HIV prevention practices.

Impact: PROMISE leads to significant community-wide progress toward consistent HIV risk reduction.

Penn Resiliency Program (Pennsylvania)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Children, Teens

Goal: The Penn Resiliency Program is a depression prevention program that seeks to reduce the longevity of symptoms exhibited and the severity of symptoms at onset of depression, through cognitive-behavioral therapy and problem-solving techniques.

Impact: The Penn Resiliency program shows that a group-based program seeking to prevent the initial onset of and decrease the exacerbation of depression children and teens by incorporating specific coping and problem-solving skills can reduce depressive symptoms over time.

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.