In the United States, multisector efforts to improve community health provide one of the best examples of integrated approaches. FHI 360 has seen firsthand through our work with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that communities can produce better – and longer lasting – health outcomes through environmental and system-level changes. By improving the environments in which people live, work, learn and play, communities are healthier and more productive.

The Building Healthy Communities project is focused on providing evidence that integrated, multisector efforts to improve community health are more effective than nonintegrated approaches. FHI 360 is conducting the following analyses as part of the project:

• State tobacco control comparison. This case study shows how evidence-based integrated approaches applied at a high intensity over time at the state level have produced greater reductions in smoking rates, secondhand smoke exposure, health care costs, cardiovascular disease incidence and lung cancer incidence than the national average or in states that do not implement integrated approaches.
• Childhood obesity approaches in Pennsylvania. For this study, FHI 360 is comparing outcomes of a highly comprehensive effort to address childhood obesity in the city of Philadelphia to a less comprehensive effort in Pittsburgh.
• Partnership for a Healthy Durham study. In 2014, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation awarded a Culture of Health prize to Durham, NC, for its multisector approach to improve public health. To gain insights on how to plan and implement successful integrated efforts, FHI 360 is conducting a qualitative study of the Durham effort to determine lessons learned and recommendations for future integrated activities.