Strategies

What Works for Health includes evidence-informed strategies to create communities where everyone can thrive.

19 Strategies
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Nurse-friendly work environments

Improve work environments for nurses via establishment of strong nursing leadership, organizational support, etc.

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Access to Care
  • Quality of Care

Nutrition prescriptions

Provide prescriptions with healthy eating goals for patients and families, often accompanied by progress checks at office visits; can include partnerships with local farmers markets via FVRx programs

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Diet and Exercise

Open Streets

Allow community members to gather, socialize, walk, run, bike, skate, etc. on streets temporarily to closed to motorized traffic; also called Ciclovía programs

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Diet and Exercise
  • Family and Social Support

Public reporting of health care-associated infections

Make health care facilities’ health care-associated or hospital-acquired infection (HAI) rates readily available to patients and providers

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Quality of Care

State-level minimum nurse staffing requirements for nursing homes

Establish state level regulations that require nursing homes to employ at least a set number of licensed and non-licensed nursing staff, often set in terms of staff hours per resident day

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Quality of Care

Trauma-informed health care

Shift the way health care organizations approach trauma by adopting universal trauma precautions and providing trauma-specific care

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Quality of Care

Urban agriculture

Support food-producing and income-earning activities in urban environments (e.g., edible landscapes, front yard or rooftop gardens, window farming, hydroponics, livestock, etc.)

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Diet and Exercise

Zoning regulations for fast food

Limit or ban fast food outlets in areas of a city, restrict the number or density of outlets, or regulate distance between fast food outlets and other sites (e.g., schools)

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Diet and Exercise