The Serviço de Atendimento Móvel de Urgência (SAMU) is the publicly funded ambulance service of Brazil. It is available throughout the country and is free to all citizens.
The SAMU has different vehicles with different equipment depending on the seriousness of the injury or disease. When calling the ambulance a medical regulator will evaluate the best procedure for the patient, send a mobile intensive care unit with doctors and nurses and reserve a bed in an emergency room of a public hospital.
Though this system appears great in theory, in practice it is often slow and unreliable. Historically, hospitals and emergency rooms were overcrowded. Today this is still a problem and leads to a lack of service and long waiting times before being treated.
To avoid being transported to a public hospital, you can call a private ambulance. Their phone numbers are not as easy to memorise as the public ambulance service, so it is best to choose a hospital before anything happens and to have the number ready in case of emergency.
Private ambulance service numbers in Brazil's major cities are:
- São Paulo: Albert Einstein Hospital (3747-1000) or (3747-1100) / Samaritan Hospital (3824-5000) or (3824-0022)
- Rio de Janeiro: Copacabana (2257-3848) / Pró-Cardíaco (private cardiac hospital) (2527-6060)
- Brasilia: Vida Ambulance (3248-3030)