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.

Submit a Promising Practice

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for Late-Life Depression

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Mental Health & Mental Disorders, Adults, Older Adults

Goal: The goal of this program is to use cognitive behavioral therapy to treat depression in older adults.

Impact: Research has shown that behavioral cognitive therapy helped patients reduce their depression symptoms, and maintained this improvement at 1-year follow-up more effectively than other types of therapy. At 6-month follow-up, clients who completed CBT were less likely to meet criteria for diagnoses of depression than clients who completed treatment as usual.

Colorectal Cancer Screening Intervention for Veterans (Chicago, IL)

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

Goal: The goal of this program was to increase colorectal cancer screening recommendations and completion rates at a Veterans Affairs medical center.

Impact: Veterans Affairs (VA) patients in the intervention group received more recommendations for colorectal cancer screening and completed more screening tests compared to those in the control group.

Columbia County Healthy Neighborhoods Program (Columbia County)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Environmental Health / Toxins & Contaminants, Families

Goal: The Healthy Neighborhoods program seeks to reduce housing related illness and injury through prevention and education.

Impact: In the past five years, the HNP visited 31,000 homes with 85,000 residents, and provided the asthma intervention to 11,000 adults and children with asthma. The assessments created a valuable data set about the health effects of housing hazards.

Community Based Mentoring Program: Palm Beach (Palm Beach and Martin, FL)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Teens, Adults

Goal: The goal of the program is to make a positive difference in the lives of children, primarily through professionally guided one-to-one relationships with caring adults, and to assist them in achieving their highest potential, as they grow to become confident, competent and caring individuals.

Comparative Cost Analysis of Housing and Case Management Program for Chronically Ill Homeless Adults Compared to Usual Care (Chicago, Illinois)

Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Housing & Homes, Adults, Urban

Goal: To assess the costs of a housing and case management program in a novel sample: homeless adults with chronic medical illnesses.

Impact: Compared to usual care, the intervention group generated an average annual cost savings of (−)$6,307 per person (95 percent CI: −16,616, 4,002; p = .23). Subgroup analyses of chronically homeless and those with HIV showed higher per person, annual cost savings of (−)$9,809 and (−)$6,622.

Compassionate Healthcare (San Francisco, CA)

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Health Care Access & Quality, Urban

Goal: Compassionate Healthcare seeks to provide affordable, accessible, and quality healthcare to the homeless and poor, offering a full range of traditional health care services, as well as HIV/AIDS, diabetes, mental health, substance abuse, and non-Western medicine services.

Complete Health Improvement Program (CHIP) (formerly the Coronary Health Improvement Project) (Rockford, IL)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Heart Disease & Stroke, Adults

Goal: The goal of the CHIP lifestyle intervention is to lower blood cholesterol, hypertension, and blood sugar levels and reduce excess weight.

Impact: CHIP has over 55,000 graduates worldwide and sustains adherence to the program guidelines through an active "ClubCHIP" member support organization.

Computers4Kids (Charlottesville, VA)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children, Urban

Goal: The overall goal of Computers4Kids is to empower disadvantaged children in the community by giving them computer skills and instilling in them self-confidence and a lifelong love of learning. C4K also strives to provide a safe, comfortable place for middle and high school students to explore their creative abilities.

Connecting Activities (Massachusetts)

Filed under Effective Practice, Economy / Employment, Children

Goal: The goal of this program is to give students the academic, technical/technological and employability skills necessary to compete in higher education and high performance workplaces.

Cooperative Integrated Reading and Composition (Baltimore, MD)

Filed under Effective Practice, Education / Student Performance K-12, Children

Goal: The goal of this program is to help all students achieve at the highest levels.

An Effective Practice meets the following HCI criteria:

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.
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:

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

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.
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.
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.