Status: draft for review — not approved for publication.
If you live in Florianópolis or are spending time in Brazil and do not speak Portuguese, this page explains what a dermatology consultation with Dr. Rafaela Salvato involves, what the Brazilian medical registrations on this site mean, and what can reasonably be addressed depending on how long you are here.
This information is educational and does not replace an individual medical assessment. Nothing here confirms a diagnosis or a course of treatment — that can only follow an in-person consultation.
Can international patients book a consultation?
Yes. Consultations can be conducted in English, and you do not need to be a Brazilian resident.
What is appropriate for you specifically cannot be determined in advance, by message or by email. A first consultation is an assessment: skin history, examination, and a discussion of what makes sense — including the possibility that the answer is to wait, to investigate further, or to do nothing.
Two situations, two different conversations
The right expectation depends on which of these describes you.
You live in Florianópolis
If Brazil is where you are based, dermatological care here can be continuous: assessment, planning, and follow-up over time.
One thing worth raising in a first consultation is where you lived before. Skin that spent decades at higher latitudes behaves differently under southern Brazilian sun exposure, and a photodamage history accumulated elsewhere is part of the clinical picture. Bringing it up is more useful than it may seem.
You are visiting or staying temporarily
A short stay changes what is realistic, and it is worth being direct about it.
An assessment is possible at any time. What a short stay constrains is anything requiring staged planning, follow-up, or observation of response over weeks. Where continuity is clinically necessary and you will not be in Brazil for it, that is a reason to postpone rather than to compress — and you should expect to be told so.
What should I bring to a first consultation?
- Identification — a passport is sufficient for foreign visitors
- Any previous dermatological reports, biopsy results or photographs of lesions you are monitoring
- A list of medications and topical products you currently use
- If relevant, where you have lived and your history of sun exposure
If your records are in a language other than English or Portuguese, a summary of dates and findings is more useful than the full document.
What language will the consultation be in?
English. Written material — reports, prescriptions, referrals — is issued in Portuguese, since that is the legal requirement for medical documentation in Brazil. If you need a document for a physician in another country, say so during the consultation so the content can be organised with that use in mind.
What do CRM-SC 14.282 and RQE 10.934 mean?
They are Brazilian medical registrations, and they are worth understanding before you compare them to anything from your own country.
CRM-SC 14.282 is the licence to practise medicine, issued by the Regional Council of Medicine of Santa Catarina. No physician can legally practise in the state without an active CRM.
RQE 10.934 is the national registry entry certifying a recognised medical specialty. This is the distinction that matters most when choosing a dermatologist in Brazil: a physician may hold a valid CRM and perform dermatological procedures without holding an RQE in dermatology.
Both numbers are public and verifiable. They are not equivalent to board certification systems used elsewhere, and this site does not present them as such.
How do I make contact?
Practical arrangements — availability, location and access — are handled directly rather than through this page.
Use the contact channel on this site to write in English. Say that you are writing in English, whether you live here or are visiting, and roughly what you would like assessed. That is enough to organise a first appointment without a long exchange.
What this page does not do
It does not offer procedure packages, prices, or treatment plans agreed before an in-person assessment. It does not compare this practice to others. It does not present patient photographs or testimonials as evidence of outcome.
Those constraints come from Brazilian medical advertising rules, set by the Federal Council of Medicine, and they apply on this site in every language. If you have encountered clinics abroad that advertise fixed outcomes for aesthetic procedures, the difference you are noticing is regulatory, not a lack of information.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to speak Portuguese?
No. Consultations can be conducted in English.
Can I get a treatment plan before I travel to Brazil?
No. A plan requires an in-person assessment. Anyone offering a defined course of treatment for your skin before examining it is doing something this practice will not do.
Is dermatological care in Brazil covered by my travel insurance?
That depends entirely on your policy, and it is a question for your insurer rather than for the practice.
I am here for two weeks. Is it worth booking?
Often yes, for assessment — particularly for lesion checks and skin cancer screening, which are single-visit questions. Whether anything beyond assessment is appropriate in that window is exactly what the consultation determines.
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*This information is educational and does not replace an individual medical assessment. Dr. Rafaela Salvato — dermatologist, Florianópolis, Santa Catarina, Brazil. CRM-SC 14.282 · RQE 10.934. Technical Director: Rafaela de Assis Salvato Balsini — CRM-SC 14.282.*
