Strategies

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

19 Strategies
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Activity programs for older adults

Offer group educational, social, creative, musical, or physical activities that promote social interactions, regular attendance, and community involvement among older adults

Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported
  • Diet and Exercise
  • Family and Social Support

Advocacy for victims of intimate partner violence

Work to partner with victims/survivors of intimate partner violence, help them with safety plans, and link them to community services (e.g., legal, housing, financial advice, emergency shelter, etc.)

Evidence Rating:
Insufficient Evidence
  • Community Safety

Community weight loss challenges

Support temporary programs that work to energize participants to lose weight via prizes, often combined with education, weight status and food intake tracking, regular check-ins, and group support

Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion
  • Diet and Exercise

Community-based social support for physical activity

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

Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported
  • Diet and Exercise

Community-wide physical activity campaigns

Engage a variety of partners in a highly visible, multi-component effort to increase physical activity, often with efforts to address cardiovascular disease risk factors

Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence
  • Diet and Exercise

Court mandated programs for perpetrators of intimate partner violence

Expand court-referred intimate partner violence offenders’ understanding of abuse, teach alternative reactions, and work to change gender role attitudes; also called batterer intervention programs (BIPs)

Evidence Rating:
Mixed Evidence
  • Community Safety

Cross-age youth peer mentoring

Establish an ongoing relationship between an older youth or young adult and a younger child or adolescent, usually an elementary or middle school student

Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence
  • Family and Social Support

Extracurricular activities for social engagement

Support organized social, art, or physical activities for school-aged youth outside of the school time

Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported
  • Family and Social Support

Family-based physical activity interventions

Increase family members’ support for physical activity, often via educational sessions on health, goal-setting, problem-solving, or family behavioral management

Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence
  • Diet and Exercise

Individually-adapted physical activity programs

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

Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported
  • Diet and Exercise