Strategies

Provide education, information, counseling, and support for breastfeeding to women throughout pre- and post-natal care

Build, strengthen, and maintain social networks that provide supportive relationships for behavior change through walking groups or other community-based interventions

Provide patients with prescriptions for exercise plans, often accompanied by progress checks at office visits, counseling, activity logs, and exercise testing

Train volunteers, professionals, or paraprofessionals to help residents assess and reduce environmental home health risks and recommend low cost changes (e.g., improved ventilation, integrated pest management, etc.)

Teach behavioral skills that can help individuals incorporate physical activity into their daily routines

Support a four-tiered approach to indoor pest control that minimizes potential hazards to people, property, and the environment

Eliminate lead-based paint and contaminated dust by removing or encapsulating lead paint, or removing lead painted fixtures and surfaces

Combine educational, environmental, and behavioral activities that increase physical activity and improve nutrition (e.g., nutrition education, aerobic/strength training, dietary prescriptions, etc.) in various settings

Deliver educational, behavioral, environmental, and other obesity prevention efforts (e.g., education classes, enhanced physical education, healthy food promotion, family outreach, etc.) in schools

Offer young children opportunities to eat healthy foods and engage in physical activity by providing fresh fruits and vegetables, incorporating physical activity into daily classroom routines, etc.

Place motivational signs on or near stairwells, elevators, and escalators that encourage individuals to use stairs

Encourage children to spend time away from TV and other stationary screen media, often as part of a multi-faceted effort to increase physical activity and improve nutrition

Arrange active transportation with a fixed route, designated stops, and pick up times when children can walk to school with adult chaperones

Make water readily available in various settings via regular placement of drinking fountains, water coolers, bottled water in vending machines, etc.

Use educational, environmental, and behavioral strategies to improve food choices and physical activity opportunities in worksite settings, also called workplace health programs