This study evaluates the understanding of the primary healthcare model. This was an exploratory qualitative study conducted in Family Health Units in Marília, São Paulo, with a sample consisting of health workers, users, and medical and nursing students at the health units. The data were collected with semi-structured interviews and submitted to content analysis (thematic modality). Regardless of the interview category and area where the family health unit was located, the interviewees' understanding of the healthcare model was the private medical care model, which reflects the predominance of curative actions in an individualist relationship, operated directly by the physician and offered according to spontaneous demand, not exclusive to the private sector. The proposal here was to use organized groups as a space for health education in which health workers and users are participants in interaction between the community's needs and active participation by users in planning the service, in addition to investment in health promotion and prevention, intended to foster adherence by the population and generating credibility in a non-doctor-centered model.