I hope many of you will find this useful…
(attached)
Emergency guide-health.pdf (314.1 KB)
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The words and phrases in both languages are excellent… but I don’t think I will ever phone them… not ever again…
Very strange that they do NOT mention anything about sending an Ambulance…
but all this info will be very helpful… so thanks Haydn…
Number 53?
sorry, you’re quite right David… they do give a phrase Page 11, No 53… sadly, they refused to send an ambulance even when asked to do so by the patient’s own Doctor… with near-fatal results… 
over an hour of time-wasting… hence this Thread…
and from what I have since learnt by chatting with people (not staff) at the hospital… SAMU seems more focused on treating the patient in their home…
Pompiers are coming out on top… as being the folk who best deal with a crisis situation… .
On a Saturday night around 10 pm in 2012 my husband started having chest and arm pains. He had been on medication for high blood pressure for a few years and had been having angina attacks for several weeks so it was pretty obvious what it was. I phoned 112 and the pompiers came - they were amazing, checked him over then called a doctor (actually two came) who confirmed a heart attack and sent him to hospital. I asked if I could accompany him and was told no, the insurance wouldn’t cover me, until I said but he speaks no French, when a phone call was made and I was told I could go. The trouble with that was that at 4am when I was kicked out, I had to find a taxi home but they called a lady driver for me! The care was superb - 100% better than he would have received in UK. He was taken to urgences in Luçon then the next day transferred to La Roche where although they failed to get a stent in the first time, a couple of days later they tried again, and that time it was successful. This was 5 years ago, things may have changed but I do hope not!
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Update on situation… my elderly friend is very low, still fighting for her life… hospital staff are amazing… but cannot say what the future holds.
I have an appointment with the local Pompe Funèbres tomorrow morning… that could be the theme of another useful Thread…
Bon courage.
On July 2nd I broke the neck of my femur, and dialled 15.
The call was answered automatically in French and then English before an operator spoke to me in French. I told her that I had fallen and broken my leg, and she told me to hang up, once she had my address.
An ambulance and a small van arrived. I was so pleased to hear those sirens. There were about eight people, including a nurse who administered intravenous morphine.
They phoned the Marie, and via them a neighbour was sent along to take charge of my animals, and lock up.
On the journey to the hospital, one young man held onto me all the way, because the rough roads were causing me to be thrown about.
They stopped three times to take my blood pressure because it was extremely high.
The nurse who had not come with us, phoned the ambulance to check how I was, about an hour into the journey.
They were all amazing.
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Our elderly friend died this morning…impossible to say whether the delay played any part in the scheme of things…and we are not going down that route.
However… the answer to my original question is quite clear:
Phone 18 for the Pompiers. They will respond swiftly… magnificent folk. 
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SAMU have needed to get their act together for some time now… this poor young lady… absolute tragedy.