Strategies

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

Revise health care processes and provider roles to integrate mental health and substance abuse treatment into primary care; continue to refer patients with severe conditions to specialty care

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

Help participants share transportation via informal arrangements between individuals, formally arranged ridesharing programs, or other ride-matching services

Use a case management model for frail elderly patients living independently, coordinating aspects of long-term care (LTC) such as status assessment, monitoring, advocacy, care planning, etc.

Restrict child-focused advertising for unhealthy foods and beverages via bans on unhealthy food and drink ads during children’s TV programs, product placement in children’s movies, etc.

Implement multi-component efforts that include coordination of health services by multidisciplinary teams of health care professionals, patient self-management, and patient education

Provide educational and behavioral interventions that support patients’ ability to actively manage their condition(s) in everyday life

Establish and support land that is gardened or cultivated by community members via community land trusts, gardening education, zoning regulation changes, or service provision (e.g., water or waste disposal)

Establish partnerships between farmers and consumers in which consumers purchase a share of a farm’s products in advance

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

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

Involve consumers in health care governance via roles on governing boards, advisory committees, or shorter-term special projects

Establish high deductible health plans paired with pre-tax medical expense accounts such as Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRAs) or Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and information tools

Increase health care providers’ skills and knowledge to understand and respond to cultural differences, value diversity, etc. via factual information, skills training, and other efforts

Tailor health care to patients’ norms, beliefs, and values, as well as their language and literacy skills

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

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

Support multiple vendor markets where producers sell goods such as fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, dairy items, and prepared foods directly to consumers

Offer payments, credits toward health insurance premiums, or other financial rewards to encourage employees to lose weight, eat more healthily, quit smoking, engage in physical activity, etc.

Offer opportunities for group purchase and distribution of selected grocery items, generally at a reduced price

Gather food left in fields after a primary harvest, food in fields where harvesting is not profitable, or excess produce from orchards, packing houses, urban agriculture sites, etc.

Offer samples of fresh fruits and vegetables in cafeterias, nutrition classes, school gardens, or workplace well-being meetings, often as part of a multi-faceted nutrition intervention

Support self-contained, homelike dwellings for 10-12 elderly adults who require nursing care; universal caregivers, usually CNAs, provide care and other supports while clinical teams visit for specialized care

Increase patients’ health-related knowledge via efforts to simplify health education materials, improve patient-provider communication, and increase overall literacy

Combine hunger relief efforts with nutrition information and healthy eating opportunities, often with on-site cooking demonstrations, recipe tastings, produce display stands, etc.

Provide more fresh fruits and vegetables, smaller portions, low fat, and reduced sodium or reduced sugar food options and other healthy foods at catered events

Increase healthy options in vending machines by reducing the price of healthy choices, increasing the number of healthy choices compared to unhealthy choices, etc.

Establish national standards for the colors of patient wristbands used to alert health care providers about specific conditions such as allergies or elevated fall risk

Inform parents about lead exposure pathways and cleaning and hygiene techniques and undertake minor repairs or specialized cleaning

Facilitate mediation between tenants and landlords to resolve conflict and prevent eviction

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

Support a collaborative approach by a multidisciplinary team of professionals working to meet the full range of long-term care (LTC) needs for frail elderly patients living in community settings

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

Provide continuous, comprehensive, whole person primary care that uses a coordinated team of medical providers across the health care system

Integrate legal services into health care settings to address legal issues that affect health (e.g., housing, food, utilities); services provided by private practice lawyers, law students, etc.

Provide a fixed, multi-component set of fall prevention interventions to older adults, usually in community settings, without an individualized risk assessment

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

Use regulation to extend nurse practitioners’ (NPs’) scope of practice to provide care to the full scope of their training and skills without physician oversight, especially for primary care

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

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

Use internet-based shopping sites to supply refrigerated, frozen, and non-perishable groceries for residential ordering and delivery

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

Use payments, vouchers, and other incentives to encourage patients to undergo preventive care such as screenings, vaccinations, etc.

Provide culturally sensitive assistance and care coordination, and guide patients through available medical, insurance, and social support; also called systems navigators

Use visual tools to prompt safe practices, standardize communication, and ensure no step is forgotten before, during, or after a medical procedure or other health care situation

Support joint decision making between health care practitioners and patients through shared decision making (SDM); part of patient-centered care

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

Engage practice coaches or facilitators to work with primary care clinic staff to redesign clinical practices, organize quality improvement efforts, improve communication, share best practices, etc.

Make pricing for hospital procedures and other health care services publicly available, often via websites, online databases, report cards, or similar tools