Promising Practices

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Physical Activity

Goal: The goal of the Market Bucks program is to encourage shopping at farmers' markets and healthier eating.

Impact: Market Bucks have successfully increased the amount of EBT purchases made at farmers markets and increased fruit and vegetable consumption among participants.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Maternal, Fetal & Infant Health, Women, Urban

Goal: The mission of MOMS Orange County is to help mothers and their families have healthy babies by providing health coordination, education, and access to community services. MOMS Orange County’s vision is that all babies born in Orange County are healthy at birth.

Impact: Measures such as the percent of babies born at a low birth weight, percent of babies born premature, and the percent of babies admitted to the NICU were all markedly better for program participants when compared to many comparison benchmarks.

Filed under Effective Practice, Community / Social Environment

Goal: The goal of this program is to promote positive family relationships, help incarcerated fathers learn skills to be active and involved fathers, encourage incarcerated fathers to
provide financial support for their children, facilitate programs for offender families through community partnerships, and provide constructive opportunities for children to participate in special activities with their incarcerated father.

Filed under Good Idea, Health / Alcohol & Drug Use, Children

Goal: Program objectives are to:

- Plan and conduct five sets of interactive tobacco prevention mini-sessions for youth and parents in multiple school-linked settings;
- Plan and implement one annual media advocacy event coordinated with the national Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids
- Plan and conduct tobacco educational outreach and implementation guidance for coaches and athletic staff. Teen Presenters deliver tobacco prevention mini-sessions to younger children, grades 1-6.

Filed under Evidence-Based Practice, Health / Respiratory Diseases, Children

Goal: The Mobile C.A.R.E. Foundation’s mission is to provide complimentary and comprehensive asthma care and education to children and families in Chicago’s underserved communities via mobile medical units called "Asthma Vans."

Impact: The Mobile C.A.R.E. Foundation’s Asthma Vans provide children and families in Chicago’s underserved communities with complimentary and comprehensive asthma care and education resulting in reduced school absenteeism, decreased ER visits and lower hospitalization rates.

Filed under Effective Practice, Health / Other Conditions, Adults, Urban

Goal: The goal of ME First/ME After is to address the gap in treatment resources for individuals waiting to be admitted to treatment for substance abuse or who are reintegrating back into the community after treatment by supporting motivation for change, increasing wellness and decreasing recidivism.

Impact: Over 200 clients participated in the ME First program in 2013. Approximately 80% of these clients completed the program and entered treatment for substance abuse with increased motivation for change.

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

Goal: The goals of Mpowerment are to mobilize young gay and bisexual men to reduce sexual risk taking, encourage regular HIV testing, and build positive social connections with peers.

Impact: The Mpowerment intervention successfully developed a mechanism to socialize young gay men to safer sex. Since this intervention relies primarily on volunteers, it is relatively inexpensive for communities to maintain and can continue to be made available for future generations.

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

Goal: The goal of MDFT is to reduce adolescent drug abuse and increase self-efficacy in the teen population.

Impact: Systematic reviews comparing the effective of adolescent drug use interventions across studies found that MDFT reduces substance use, delinquency, behavior problems, and symptoms of anxiety and depression. The program has also been found to improve educational performance.

Filed under Good Idea, Environmental Health / Air

Goal: NCDC participants are committed to reducing diesel emissions and finding innovative ways to protect human health and the environment. To fully address the challenges of reducing diesel emissions the NCDC is using a multi-pronged approach:

- Commitment to the successful implementation of the 2007 Highway Engine Rule and the Clean Air Nonroad Diesel Rule.
- Developing new emissions standards for locomotive and marine diesel engines.
- Promoting the reduction of emissions for existing diesel engines through cost-effective and innovative strategies, including use of cleaner fuels, retrofitting and repairing existing fleets, idling reduction among others.

Filed under Good Idea, Economy / Poverty

Goal: To increase the amount of fresh produce and nutritious foods that are distributed to local food banks across the United States through the Feeding America network.