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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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CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Reducing Alcohol-Impaired Driving: Sobriety Checkpoints (USA)

CDC

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Prevention & Safety, Adults

Impact: The Community Preventive Services Task Force (CPSTF) recommends publicized sobriety checkpoint programs to reduce alcohol-impaired driving.

CDC COMMUNITY GUIDE: Reducing Tobacco Use Initiation: Increasing the Unit Price of Tobacco Products (USA)

CDC

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

Goal: The goals is to make the use of tobacco products less attractive to young people
who have limited incomes and a variety of ways to spend their money.

Impact: These interventions that increase the price of tobacco products
showed strong evidence of their effectiveness in:
• Reducing tobacco use among adolescents and adults
• Reducing population consumption of tobacco products
• Increasing tobacco use cessation

Foster Children's Project (Palm Beach)

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Governance, Children, Urban

Goal: To advocate for children and help them resolve their most pressing legal problem: being in the custody of the state when they need to be in the custody of a family - biological or adoptive - within the 12 months provided by law.

Impact: Children represented by the Foster's Children Project were more likely to exit the foster system to permanency due to higher rates of adoption and long-term custody, but not reunification, than their peers not represented by FCP.

Required Influenza Vaccination for Children in Licensed Child Care or Preschool Programs

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Community / Governance, Children

Goal: The goal of requiring that all Connecticut children receive at least 1 dose of influenza vaccine each year to attend a licensed child care program and preschool setting is to reduce influenza transmission and decrease influenza-associated hospitalizations statewide.

Impact: Requiring vaccination for admission into a licensed child care program or preschool program has helped to increase vaccination rates among children in Connecticut and reduced serious morbidity from influenza statewide.

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.
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