Strategies

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

Offer programs to help individuals without a high school diploma or its equivalent achieve a high school equivalency credential

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

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

Use websites, computer programs, and other electronic means to provide information, strategies, or behavioral support to tobacco users who want to quit, sometimes with counseling or pharmacotherapy

Offer flexible working arrangements, allowing the duties of a single full-time position to be covered by two part-time employees

Organize workers to bargain collectively for improved wages, benefits, and working conditions

Use broad media-based efforts to educate large groups of current and potential tobacco users about the dangers of tobacco use

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.