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Public health is currently faced with an array of critical challenges and disconnects. Research and evaluation have identified a number of evidence-based strategies for effecting behavior change at individual, group, organizational, and environmental levels, all of which hold promise for leading to substantial reductions in morbidity and mortality, and increased quality of life. Unfortunately, there is huge variability across the public health system in awareness of the value of using evidence to inform decision making, let alone in capacity to locate, assess, compare, select, justify, adapt, implement, and evaluate evidence-based strategies, or to participate in building the evidence base for practice-based innovations. As a result, many communities may not be benefitting from research-tested and practice-based strategies that could help them to meet their public health goals more efficiently and effectively. CDC's Interactive Systems Framework for Dissemination and Implementation (ISF), released in 2008, was designed to help close this gap between research and practice. This commentary identifies the ways in which the ISF framework is useful in addressing the research practice gap; revisits the elements of the framework that have continued to guide research and practice in fruitful ways; and highlights areas that need further development to meet current public health challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Systematic reviews are generating valuable scientific knowledge about the impact of public health laws, but this knowledge is not readily accessible to policy makers. We identified 65 systematic reviews of studies on the effectiveness of 52 public health laws: 27 of those laws were found effective, 23 had insufficient evidence to judge effectiveness, 1 was harmful, and 1 was found to be ineffective. This is a valuable, scientific foundation — that uses the highest relevant standard of evidence — for the role of law as a public health tool. Additional primary studies and systematic reviews are needed to address significant gaps in knowledge about the laws' public health impact, as are energetic, sustained initiatives to make the findings available to public policy makers. (Am J Public Health. 2009;99:17-24. doi:10.2105/AJPH. 2007.130278) [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Responding to growing impatience with the limited application of research findings to health practices and policies, both funding bodies and communities are demanding that research show greater sensitivity to communities' perceptions, needs, and unique circumstances. One way to assure this is to employ participatory research-to engage communities at least in formulating research questions and interpreting and applying research findings and possibly also in selecting methods and analyzing data. "Community" should be interpreted broadly as all who will be affected by the research results, including lay residents of a local area, practitioners, service agencies, and policymakers. Participatory research should not be required of every project, but when results are to be used for, in, and by communities, those communities should collaborate not only in applying findings but also in determining the ways in which the findings are produced and interpreted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context The objective of this systematic review was to determine the costs, benefits, and overall economic value of communication campaigns that included mass media and distribution of specified health-related products at reduced price or free of charge. Evidence acquisition Economic evaluation studies from a literature search from January 1980 to December 2009 were screened and abstracted following systematic economic review methods developed by The Community Guide. Data were analyzed in 2011. Evidence synthesis The economic evidence was grouped and assessed by type of product distributed and health risk addressed. A total of 15 evaluation studies were included in the economic review, involving campaigns promoting the use of child car seats or booster seats, pedometers, condoms, recreational safety helmets, and nicotine replacement therapy. Conclusions Economic merits of the intervention could not be determined for health communication campaigns associated with use of recreational helmets, child car seats, and pedometers, primarily because available economic information and analyses were incomplete. There is some evidence that campaigns with free condom distribution to promote safer sex practices were cost-effective among high-risk populations and the cost per quit achieved in campaigns promoting tobacco cessation with nicotine replacement therapy products may translate to a cost per quality-adjusted life-year less than $50,000. Many interventions were publicly funded trials or programs, and the failure to properly evaluate their economic cost and benefit is a serious gap in the science and practice of public health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]