Strategies

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

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.

Use databases, housed in state agencies, to track prescribing and dispensing of Schedule II, III, IV, and V drugs and other controlled substances

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

Provide interpretation services for patients with limited English proficiency (LEP) in outpatient and inpatient health care settings, following training and certification

Establish programs that accept expired, unwanted, or unused medicines from designated users and dispose of them responsibly

Make clinician, hospital, clinic, long-term care facility, and insurance plan performance on health care quality measures publicly available via report cards, reporting websites, or similar tools

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

Introduce or expand transportation options that are available to the public and run on a scheduled timetable (e.g., buses, trains, ferries, rapid transit, etc.)

Prevent radon from entering occupied buildings and reduce existing indoor air radon levels via soil depressurization, home or room pressurization, heat recovery ventilation, etc.

Transition families and individuals experiencing homelessness into permanent housing quickly, often with supports such as short-term financial assistance, case management, landlord negotiations, etc.

Conduct individual assessments that gauge older adults’ risk of falling and develop personalized approaches to help prevent falls

Establish transportation services for areas with low population densities using publicly funded buses and vans on a set schedule, dial-a-ride transit, volunteer ridesharing, etc.

Promote walking and biking to school through education, incentives, and environmental changes; often called SRTS

Provide permanent, basic rental housing with social services available on-site or by referral, usually for families with low incomes, older adults, veterans, or people with disabilities

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

Provide sterile injection equipment and often other treatment and referral services to people who inject drugs; also called needle or syringe exchange programs and needle syringe programs

Create designated tax districts that generate revenue to invest in affordable housing initiatives, blight remediation, and economic development efforts

Modify the built environment to affect traffic speed and patterns via speed humps, pedestrian center crossing islands, roundabouts, etc.

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

Create financial incentives or remove financial disincentives to affect consumer choices and incentivize provision of cost efficient health care services

Use the purchasing power of employers and groups of insured individuals to create incentives and disincentives for health care providers to deliver high quality, high value care

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

Provide assistance to families with low incomes to make their homes more energy efficient and to permanently reduce their energy bills

Reform zoning regulations to remove exclusionary zoning codes, address physical environment aesthetics and safety, street continuity and connectivity, residential density, and mixed-use development, etc.