Patients who visit health facilities in the Greater Accra Region spend at least four hours on the average.

The result of a survey conducted by the greater Accra Regional Directorate of the Ghana Health Service indicates that patients spend about an hour at nurses' station, another one hour at the records office and two hours waiting to see the doctor.

The Regional Director of Health Service, Dr. Irene Agyepong said this was three hours more than the internationally accepted number of hours.

She attributesd the delay partly to shortfall in medical staff as well as inefficiencies in the health care delivery system.