Ambulance in Tunis

Bab Saadoun and La Rabta, the city's main hospital district

The Bab Saadoun area, on the edge of the medina, brings together several large public facilities. Charles Nicolle Hospital stands on Boulevard du 9-Avril 1938, a street that is also home to the Hédi Raïs Institute of Ophthalmology, the Salah Azaiez Institute, which specialises in cancer care, and the Béchir Hamza Children's Hospital. Close by, the La Rabta district houses the hospital of the same name and the Mongi Ben Hamida National Institute of Neurology.

These facilities are close neighbours, but each one has its own entrances, blocks and departments. For an admission or a radiotherapy session, give us the exact name of the department and, if you know it, the block as well: that detail saves the patient from being dropped off at the main reception desk.

Montfleury, the Kasbah and the lanes of the medina

South of the medina, Montfleury hill is home to Habib Thameur Hospital and to the Military Hospital of Tunis (Hôpital militaire principal d'instruction de Tunis), which serves, among others, Defence personnel and their families. Aziza Othmana Hospital, regarded as the oldest in the capital, stands on Place du Gouvernement, in the Kasbah.

The medina brings its own constraint: an ambulance cannot be driven through its narrow lanes. When a patient lives in the old town, the vehicle stops at the nearest point it can reach, often a gate or a square at its edge, and the crew covers the rest of the way on foot with a carry chair or a stretcher. Tell us the number of steps as well: the arrangements depend on it.

From La Marsa to La Manouba, the suburban hospitals

Many journeys start or finish in the suburbs. To the north, Mongi Slim Hospital is located in La Marsa. In Ariana, Abderrahmen Mami Hospital is known for its respiratory medicine departments. To the south, Ben Arous is home to the Trauma and Major Burns Centre. To the west, the Mohamed Kassab Institute, which specialises in orthopaedics, stands at Ksar Saïd, in the governorate of La Manouba.

These facilities are often the starting point for a journey home to another region, or the destination of a transfer from a hospital in the centre. Tell us the exact municipality where the patient is to be collected: between Gammarth and Mornag, for example, the route and the way onto the motorway have nothing in common.

Tunis-Carthage Airport and the other airports

Tunis-Carthage International Airport, the country's main airport, lies about 8 km north-east of the city centre, close to the business district of Les Berges du Lac: allow about 20 minutes by road outside peak hours. It is the usual gateway for medical repatriations. EMS handles the ground leg: meeting the patient at the point agreed with the assistance company and the airport services, then the journey on to a hospital in Tunis, a home address or a city in the Sahel.

Some flights also leave from Enfidha-Hammamet International Airport or Monastir Habib Bourguiba International Airport, further south. For a departure, send us the flight number and the check-in time; for an arrival, the scheduled time and the name of the assistance company looking after the passenger.

Typical road times from Tunis

Long-distance journeys heading south take the A1 motorway, which starts near Radès, in the governorate of Ben Arous. Here are indicative road times from central Tunis, not counting the pick-up itself or traffic jams:

• Tunis – Enfidha-Hammamet Airport: about 105 km, about 1 h 15 by road
• Tunis – Sousse: about 140 km, about 1 h 45 by road
• Tunis – Monastir, city or Habib Bourguiba Airport: about 170 km, about 2 h by road
• Tunis – Sfax: about 270 km, about 3 h by road

A patient lying flat or very tired may call for a gentler pace or a stop along the way, and crossing Tunis at peak hours lengthens the first part of the journey. We therefore set the pick-up time from the expected arrival time, not the other way round.

Getting around Greater Tunis

In Tunis, the difficulty lies less in the distances than in the density of the traffic. At the start and end of the office day, the interchanges and main roads clog up, particularly around the city centre and Les Berges du Lac. Between the southern and northern suburbs, the Radès–La Goulette bridge, opened in 2009 to replace the ferry, often makes it possible to reach La Goulette, Carthage or La Marsa without crossing the centre.

In summer, the roads along the northern coast are busier, especially in the evening. In older buildings in the centre, there is sometimes no lift, or the lift is too small to take a stretcher: tell us the floor as soon as you make your request.

Arranging transport to or from Tunis

Call EMS or message us on WhatsApp with both addresses (department and block for a hospital, flight number for Tunis-Carthage), the date, the time by which the patient must have arrived and how independently they can move.

A dedicated coordinator calls you back in under 10 minutes to confirm the route, across the city or down the A1, decide on the level of support and send you a quote before anything is confirmed. Based in Monastir, the EMS team regularly runs journeys between Tunis and the Sahel. As a private service, EMS does not replace the SAMU (190), the public emergency medical service: in a life-threatening situation, call the public emergency services first.