Bringing evidence-based interventions to the field: the fidelity challenge

Fidelity of implementation in replicating evidence-based health promotion interventions, to ensure implementation as designed and proven through research, is crucial if evidence-based community and population health interventions are to achieve promised results but can be difficult to attain in practice. This article highlights major challenges, considerations, and strategies associated with fidelity as public health care practitioners implement evidence-based interventions and bring them to scale in the field. There is need for sharing information about "what works" in implementing these interventions with fidelity, as well sharing information about implementation challenges and improvements to intervention design. Fidelity is important if practitioners are to obtain results and outcomes planned by intervention developers and is an essential value proposition for evidence-based public health practice and population health improvement.