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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Office of Disease Prevention and Health Promotion

Public Health Program Planning

“I want to help my community implement a tobacco cessation program that’s proven to work.”

Implementing health interventions is a crucial step toward improving community health outcomes at the local, tribal, territorial, state, or national level. This example describes how a public health professional could use Evidence-Based Resources (EBRs) to implement a tobacco cessation program.

1. Identify the need.

What is the public health problem you’re trying to solve? For example: “A large percentage of people in my community struggle with reducing their tobacco use, and this has a major impact on public health outcomes — such as higher rates of cancer, stroke, heart disease, and COPD.” 

2. See how the need aligns with national goals.

Improving outcomes at the local, tribal, territorial, and state level is key to achieving Healthy People 2030 objectives. Check out all of the Tobacco Use objectives to find the ones that are most relevant to your work.

3. Explore EBRs related to your goals.

From an objective’s overview page, find related EBRs by choosing the Evidence-Based Resources tab in the left-hand navigation menu. Look for EBRs that will help you design a tobacco cessation program. These EBRs include systematic reviews, intervention programs, non-systematic reviews, reports, advisories, and much more.

4. Engage with your community partners and ask for feedback.

Interventions don’t work without buy-in from the community. Meet with your partners — like community members, local leaders, state government officials, and nonprofit organizations — to make sure your approach aligns with the goals of the community.

5. Draft your intervention plan.

Based on your research and community discussions, finalize your approach and how you’ll measure success. Be sure to include the ways you’ll address social determinants of health to prioritize populations that have been disproportionately affected. Cite the EBRs you’ve referenced to highlight the science and evidence on which your intervention plan is based and to add credibility to your proposal.

6. Gain support for your initiative.

Bring your plan back to the community! Show them how you’ve listened to their feedback and made improvements. Highlight the positive impacts of your plan — and how government, the private sector, and nonprofits can work together to benefit the community as a whole.

7. Implement your plan.

You have the research, the resources, and the buy-in — now it’s time to put your plan into action! Leverage your support systems and the vast bodies of past work to decrease tobacco use, especially in disproportionally affected communities.

8. Evaluate your plan.

Make sure to track your progress — you can even benchmark your progress by using Healthy People 2030 objective data. In addition, many EBRs include information about how to effectively evaluate your program over time. And with Healthy People 2030 population data, you can track disparities across populations — and work to reduce those disparities in your community.