Wanna see how SUS really works ? I'm sitting in the UPA right now.

Just had X-rays done. Waiting to see the doctor again.

Just left the UPA with a prescription for 2 antibiotics. X-ray confirmed lung infection and inflammation.

Less than 25 minutes. In Canada that would be 3-6 hours at a walk in clinic.

This was in a city of 350,000 people with one SUS hospital only. In Rio I have an UPA in the same block as my apartment, but, it's always a 3-6 hour wait for non-emergency treatment due to the volume of patients.

We also have medical cooperatives here where you pay R$50 a month and you get medical access in 24 hours usually as well as discounted tests, etc. Sort of like a patient funded private members clinic. I belong to one of those as well as I have a private doctor I pay for as needed.

@kolyaS122HSU, sorry to hear about your situation.  Hope that you get well soon.

I slept under the fan overnight while uncovered, after a shower in 40 degree heat. My bad. Wife says "I told you so"........

I slept under the fan overnight while uncovered, after a shower in 40 degree heat. My bad. Wife says "I told you so"........ - @kolyaS122HSU

That can be a dangerous condition, please do take good care of this and take the required medication. 

Apparently, the same thing happened to me when I was about 3 months old.  Without the proper medication within the required time, I would not be here to write about it.

I do not remember a thing but I do have a memento of the event as there is extensive scarring in one of my lungs.

Azitromicina

Prednisone

Dipirona

Doctor says viral bronchitis.

2 kick ass antibiotics and "Mexican asirin" for pain LOL you cannot get Dipirona in Canada at all. Stuff works great, like Percocet. Total cost R$80.......about $13 USD or 1/3 the cost of the drug deductible copay amount on my Canadian health plan. X-rays were free.

YMMV obviously but this is the third or fourth time I have used SUS in 3 different cities and each experience, except for the wait in Rio, was great.

01/06/25 @kolya122HSU.  Get well soon! 

And thanks for the report on your care at SUS:  it's good for expats to be able to see a factual, first-person account like yours, and the one we've been getting from @alan279. Brazilians criticize it all the time (of course!) and it has a lot of shortcomings, but it's a good public healthcare system, especially for a middle-income country.

IMHO it is decades and miles ahead of the supposedly free and widely touted best in the world Canadian system. Which as a former Canadian I can swear in a court of law is an utter pathetic falsification and a shell of it's former self. Rant over 😁

We also have medical cooperatives here where you pay R$50 a month and you get medical access in 24 hours usually as well as discounted tests, etc. Sort of like a patient funded private members clinic. I belong to one of those as well as I have a private doctor I pay for as needed. - @kolyaS122HSU

Your medical cooperative sounds interesting. How could I find one where I live?

The one I use is called Pastore Assist and seems to mainly be domiciled in Rio de Janeiro and area.

They all have offices where the various doctors work out of. In my case I have seen either several signs on the street at or near where they are open, or different kinds of physical ads in the streets. There are 3-4 in Rio alone that I know. You can also do a web search for "clinica populare" as this is another term for a similar concept.

@kolyaS122HSU

There are several similar clinics in Ilhéus. I hadn't noticed them before.

Thanks.

My private doctor just did a check up and I did about R$1.500 of tests she wanted thru this cooperative. Saved about $700 versus the regular lab prices, at the same lab as well. Good luck.

@kolyaS122HSU

This is why I bought an air conditioner which I keep at 26c mainly to keep the humidity under control. There’s a lot of mold in Brazil especially in the rainy season. The AC is in an adjacent room to our bedroom so it doesn’t blast on us and also allows us to keep our bedroom window shut so we never are annoyed by mosquitoes. My 18,000 btu unit cost around 45 dollars to run per month. Cheap insurance against various health woes, in my opinion.

@kolyaS122HSU
This is why I bought an air conditioner which I keep at 26c mainly to keep the humidity under control. There’s a lot of mold in Brazil especially in the rainy season. The AC is in an adjacent room to our bedroom so it doesn’t blast on us and also allows us to keep our bedroom window shut so we never are annoyed by mosquitoes. My 18,000 btu unit cost around 45 dollars to run per month. Cheap insurance against various health woes, in my opinion. - @bepmoht

I've lived on the beach in Ilhéus witbout air conditioning for 16 years. Without mosquitoes. With my windows open year round.

I agree. Our AC has been broken in Copa since August, but since we only spend weekends in Rio nowadays, we haven't gotten around to buying a replacement yet.

This year has been colder than others too, so, an open window usually does the trick.

@alan279

I live in the interior, a totally different world.

@alan279
I live in the interior, a totally different world. - @bepmoht

How is your life different?

@alan279

Well just to discuss the climatic and geographical differences, in Pancas ES we are about 4 hours from the coast. We rarely have any breeze or wind to speak of. The city is built in a valley surrounded by high granite mountains (similar to Sugarloaf in Rio). These rocks block any winds, heat up and hold the heat creating a microclimate making it warmer than the surrounding area (just 5 km outside Pancas it’s often 3-4 degrees cooler). During the rainy season we usually have heavy tropical rains sometimes with thunderstorms one or twice a day. Occasionally we have days where it rains the entire day. This occasionally causes flooding which effectively cuts off the city from the outside world for sometimes days. On days when the sun shines, it’s blazing hot and very humid. Due to all the precipitation and the clay rich soils we do indeed have mosquitoes and other bugs which love to visit our homes especially in the evenings during the rain storms. The city is very rural and they almost never spray to reduce mosquitoes like I’ve seen in the big cities (once they sprayed this year).  So, this place is a lot different than the utopian coastal cities that exist in the world but the people are indeed, “The salt of the earth types”. Hard working agricultural workers growing our world’s coffee and cocoa. For those who don’t know, tiny Espirito Santo is the second largest coffee producing state in Brazil after Minas Gerais and Pancas ES is surrounded by coffee plantations.

@kolyaS122HSU

My experience with SUS has been quite different. After five visits to the neighborhood SUS clinic in September and October, I was referred to an ophthalmology clinic, because I had already been diagnosed by a private clinic for cataracts in August.

So I went to the SUS affiliated ophthalmology clinic five times for exams in October. Then I went to the SUS affiliated eye hospital three times for more exams in November.

Then I waited three hours for surgery and was told that there was a paperwork problem in late November.

Then my surgery was cancelled the next week because my lens hadn’t arrived.

No one works in December.

The ophthalmology clinic has ceased operations in January because of nonpayment by the city of Ilhéus in December by the outgoing mayor who is under federal investigation for corruption.

Five months in and I’m slowly going blind for lack of a simple surgery. 

@alan279 damn hope it’s resolved soon. Prayers !!!

@alan279, is it cataract surgery?  Is it easier to go the "private" route rather than SUS?  Not sure if this is even possible.

I’m getting quotes from several eye hospitals for cataract surgery now. Two hospitals have quoted me R$4.000 per eye plus lens.

I’m getting quotes from several eye hospitals for cataract surgery now. Two hospitals have quoted me R$4.000 per eye plus lens. - @alan279

Hope that the surgery goes well.  Good luck.

Is it easier to go the "private" route rather than SUS? Not sure if this is even possible. - @Pablo888

You can do everything privately in Brasil if you do not want to go thru SUS. Private consultations can even be done thru Zoom or WhatsApp video calls. The private sector works great. One of the big advantages of living here versus other countries.

In Cabo Frio for example the city hadn't paid the doctors recently for months, so they stopped working. The previous city administration either stole or mismanaged things to a great extent. But given as it's Brasil, I'm going to bet on fraud. This is a massive problem with smaller jurisdictions around the country.