Best Practices

One goal of the New England Futures project is to identify existing projects in New England, or around the United States, that represent innovative and proven models for creating a healthier New England. We invite you to submit projects that you believe represent a best practices to info@newenglandfutures.org.

Health Information Technology

Aroostook Medical Center (Maine)
Aroostook Medical Center was one of 16 hospitals to receive a grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to implement health information technology (health IT) systems to improve the safety and quality of health care. The Chronic Care Technology Project will facilitate the transfer of information among providers and patients in the Presque Isle community; implement a model of chronic care management; and educate area health care providers on how best to use current information systems to communicate with each other.
Mt. Ascutney Hospital and Health Center (Vermont)
Mt. Ascutney Hospital and Health Center was one of 16 hospitals to receive a grant from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ) to implement health information technology (health IT) systems to improve the safety and quality of health care. The project, entitled Improving Rural Healthcare with Technology, will utilizes existing health IT standards to integrate the current stand-alone databases and information systems of a consortium of three rural healthcare systems as the basis for creating a comprehensive electronic health record for patient care.
Rhode Island Health Improvement Initiative
The Rhode Island Health Improvement Initiative (RIHII), led by the Rhode Island Quality Institute, will demonstrate that science-based, appropriate, cost-effective care can be delivered consistently across an entire community. This will be accomplished by reorganizing the delivery of health care: more specifically, by implementing a full suite of clinical information systems and process improvements across the entire community of physicians and other clinicians; interconnecting the physicians, hospitals, labs, imaging systems, and other providers within the community; encouraging adoption of best practice innovations with economic and non-economic incentives; and creating a local governance structure. RIHII will measure the improvements in clinical outcomes, quality, safety, consumer satisfaction and cost.
SureScripts Electronic Prescribing System
The Rhode Island Quality Institute has partnered with SureScripts, a collaborative effort between independent and chain pharmacies across the nation to implement state-wide electronic connectivity between all retail pharmacies and all prescribers in the state. Rhode Island is the national beta test site for this important innovation that improves the safety, quality and efficiency of the prescribing process.

Healthy Communities Initiatives

Champlain Intiative (Vermont)
Champlain Initiative is a community wide initiative focused on improving the quality of life in Chittenden County by 2016. The Initiative, begun five years ago, identifies indicators of a healthy community, measures the trends of those indicators, and - where the trends are negative - it assembles people and resources to "bend the trend" back in a healthy direction. Champlain Initiative teams of volunteers are working on addressing racism in the schools, early childhood education, sustainable jobs, neighborhood connections, civic duty, health insurance for children, physical fitness opportunities and spiritual health.
Healthy Neighborhoods/Healthy Kids (Vermont)
The Healthy Neighborhoods/Healthy Kids program engages youth in community planning and revitalization activities by having 4th and 5th grade students draw connections between the design of their communities and impacts on their health. This program is a collaboration of the Vermont Forum on Sprawl and the Sustainable Schools Project (a partnership of Shelburne Farms, Vermont Education for Sustainability and Burlington's Legacy Project). Program staff work with teachers in the school to develop the curriculum, activities, messages and guide for the parents.
Franklin Community Health Network (Maine)
Franklin Community Health Network (FCHN) is a locally controlled, nonprofit, integrated network of rural health-care providers, created by Franklin Memorial Hospital in 1991. Its mission is to work cooperatively with other concerned individuals and organizations to achieve the highest level of health and wellness possible for the people of west central Maine. Located in one of Maine’s most depressed rural counties, FCHN has focused hard on anti-smoking efforts (especially among young mothers and families) and now can claim Maine’s lowest smoking rate.
Healthy City Fall River (Massachusetts)
The Mayor's Office of the City of Fall River, working in cooperation with Partners for a Healthier Community, launched the development of a Healthy City Fall River Initiative in 2003. The initiative is in partnership with the Massachusetts Department of Public Health's Community Health Network Area organization and Partners for a Healthier Community, Inc. Using input gathered from over 1,000 residents during the summer of 2003 and the results of a city-wide voting process in September, the initiative identified five Action Priority Areas. These priority areas were then connected with all known existing efforts in the City, and a final action plan was produced. The impact of each of these activities will be assessed by an ongoing analysis and presented to the community in periodic reports.
Healthy Valley 2000 (Connecticut)
Healthy Valley 2000, the first healthy community project in the state of Connecticut, was officially launched in October 1994 after more than a year of work and preparation. The project includes six Naugatuck Valley towns of Ansonia, Derby, Shelton, Seymour, Beacon Falls and Oxford located in South Central Connecticut, with a combined population of 96,000 and an area of 100 square miles. The goal of Healthy Valley 2000 is to make the Valley a better place in which to live, work, raise a family and enjoy life by measurably improving the quality of life and health of the community and its residents. The project led to the valley winning one of the 10 highly-coveted All-America City awards from the National Civic League in 2000.
KIDS COUNT, A Project of the Annie E. Casey Foundation
KIDS COUNT, a project of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, is a national and state-by-state effort to track the status of children in the U.S. By providing policymakers and citizens with benchmarks of child well-being, KIDS COUNT seeks to enrich local, state, and national discussions concerning ways to secure better futures for all children. KIDS COUNT initiatives exist in the all six New England states: Connecticut (www.cahs.org); Maine (www.mekids.org); Massachusetts (www.masskids.org); New Hampshire (www.childrennh.org); Rhode Island (www.rikidscount.org); and Vermont (www.childrensforum.org).
Walk New Hampshire
Walk New Hampshire is a program designed to promote walking for children, 6 to 12 year olds in New Hampshire. The goal is to engage children in walking and raise awareness of walking as a part of a healthy lifestyle. Each child who participates receives a log to record the number of miles they walk. Children who reach their chosen goal receive an 'I Walked NH' patch and a certificate signed by Governor John Lynch. They will also receive an invitation to a special statewide celebration in June 2006 and be eligible for prizes to be raffled off at the celebration.

Patient-Centered Hospitals

Copley Hospital (Vermont)
At Copley Hospital "Patient Centered Care," is a popular term these days in hospital circles, is far more than a marketing phrase. Copley's patients consistently rank Copley in the top 3% of overall satisfaction when compared to nearly 6,000 other facilities across the country. Meeting patient needs is the overriding goal of every Copley employee, from admitting representative to discharge planner. Patients are encourage to as questions since Copley believes that to make good healthcare decisions, patients need to understand all the choices available and how they will affect their health.
Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center (New Hampshire)
The mission of Dartmouth-Hitchcock's Center for Shared Decision Making is to provide an excellent decision support service that fosters shared decision making between patients and health care providers; to characterize the ways in which decision support and decision aids are most helpful for patients, providers, the health care institution, insurers, and the community; and to document the life of the Center as the prototype of a dedicated decision support service for other health care entities throughout the world.
Griffin Hospital (Connecticut)
Griffin Hospital's mission is to provide personalized, humanistic, consumer-driven health care in a healing environment; to empower individuals to be actively involved in decisions affecting their care and well-being through access to information and education; and to provide leadership to improve the health of the community we serve. Fundamental to Griffin's philosophy is empowering people and providing the knowledge to make them active partners responsible for maintaining their health and making decisions about their care and treatment. Griffin is also among a small number of hospitals that report quality information and patient satisfaction ratings on its Web site.

State Initiatives

Healthy America: Wellness Where We Live, Work, and Learn
Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, the new Chairman of the National Governors Association, has launched a national initiative with his mission to build a culture of physical activity, prevention and wellness in the United States. This initiative focuses on how to create healthy states by building healthier communities, work and schools.
Healthy Arkansas
Healthy Arkansas, launched by Gov. Mike Huckabee when he shed 110 pounds after being told he had type II diabetes, is a comprehensive effort to clearly define specific areas where behavioral changes can lead to healthier citizens. The burden of chronic diseases, including diabetes, stroke, lung and heart diseases, and cancer, is higher in Arkansas than in the nation generally. Tobacco use, obesity, and physical inactivity are the three primary causes of these and other serious chronic conditions. The Healthy Arkansas website provides strategies to reduce and/or eliminate the three primary behavior-related causes of these diseases with information on nutrition, physical activity and smoking cessation.
Healthy Maine Partnerships
Healthy Maine Partnerships (HMP) is a new initiative that was established to link aspects of four Bureau of Health programs. Healthy Maine Partnerships (HMP) is a new initiative that was established to link aspects of four Bureau of Health programs: Partnership For A Tobacco-Free Maine (PTM), Maine Cardiovascular Health Program (MCVHP), Community Health Program (CHP), and the Bureau of Health Coordinated School Health Programs (BOH, CSHP), in collaboration with the Department of Education’s Coordinated School Health Program (DOE, CSHP). The coordination of the state and local intervention activities are funded by the tobacco settlement and assures linkages with related program activities.
Maine Quality Forum
In 2003 Governor Baldacci and your Maine Legislature created the Maine Quality Forum, as an independent division of Dirigo Health, to continue Maine's leadership in assuring high quality healthcare for its citizens. The Maine Quality Forum's mission is to advocate for high quality healthcare and help each Maine citizen make informed healthcare choices.
Rhode Island's Plan for Healthy Eating and Active Living
In 2001, the Rhode Island Department of Health (HEALTH) was one of the first six states to receive funding from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to respond to this epidemic. HEALTH established the Initiative for a Healthy Weight (IHW) to build the state’s capacity to reverse this epidemic. From 2002 to 2004, a diverse group of over one hundred Rhode Islanders, representing communities, schools, worksites, and the health care system, worked with the Initiative for a Healthy Weight staff to develop recommendations for obesity prevention. These recommendations were used to develop Rhode Island’s Plan for Healthy Eating and Active Living. This plan addresses the obesity epidemic by focusing on four targeted behaviors: nutrition, breastfeeding, physical activity, and screen time.

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