This article describes the salient features of the McGill model of nursing, (ie, health, family, collaboration, and learning), within the health, person, environment, and nursing paradigm. According to the model, the central goal of nursing is to maintain, strengthen, and develop the patient's health by actively engaging him or her in a learning process. Because health is a learned phenomenon and the family is considered the primary socializer in this learning, the family is the focus of nursing. The nurse strives to structure a learning environment that enables the patient to participate as fully as possible. The nurse and patient together set goals and, building on the patient's strengths and resources, devise means of achieving them.