Which model views health care as extending beyond the medical model and emphasizes prevention and a multicausal approach to problems?

• A. Medical model
• B. Client strengths
• C. Public health model
• D. Barriers

Answer: (C)

The public health model expands health care beyond treating illness to preventing it and using a multicausal view of problems. It looks at health at the population level and considers a range of factors—biological, behavioral, social, economic, and environmental—that influence outcomes. Interventions focus on prevention across levels (promoting healthy behaviors, changing policies, improving living conditions, and ensuring access to preventive services) and address the broader determinants of health, not just individual treatment. This contrasts with the medical model, which centers on diagnosing and treating disease after it arises, while the client strengths approach focuses on an individual’s resources, and barriers describe obstacles to care rather than a holistic framework for prevention and multiple causative factors.