Implement an Evidence-Based Program

The Office of Substance Use and Mental Health encourages and supports community centered evidence-based prevention, with gold-standard prevention models. Effective prevention strictly follows the five basic phases found in the Strategic Prevention Frameworkopens in a new tab. These models include using evidence-based programs and environmental plans to address selected priority risk and protective factors to have a healthy influence on youth development and community well-being.

Blueprints for Healthy Youth Development Programsopens in a new tab is a respectable registry of evidence-based positive youth development programs designed to encourage the health and well-being of children and teens. Blueprints programs are family, school, or community-based and target all levels of need — from broad prevention programs that encourage positive behaviors while decreasing negative behaviors, to highly-targeted programs for at-risk children and troubled teens, that get them back on track. The use of these programs is supported by SUMH.

The Utah Evidence-Based Workgroup was also created in response to the need to identify other evidence-based, substance use disorder prevention programs, considered effective in our state. The workgroup is made up of experts in the fields of prevention and evaluation. Using the Tiers of Effectivenessopens in a new tab, programs are tested and coached through the certification process to become recognized as an evidence-based program.