Hypertension, diabetes and mental illness are rising across Ghana, yet many of the clinics people reach first are not set up to diagnose or treat them.
A survey of 207 primary health care facilities in the Greater Accra and Eastern Regions found that only 38.6% offered hypertension services, 35.2% offered diabetes services and 38.1% offered mental health services. Those figures describe whether a clinic provides diagnosis or management at all, not how well it does so.
The gap is sharpest at the front line. Of 116 Community-based Health Planning and Services compounds in the sample, just 4.2% offered hypertension care, and only 2.5% offered diabetes or mental health care. District hospitals, by contrast, all offered hypertension and diabetes services, and 78.6% offered mental health care.
Where a clinic sits also matters. Hypertension services were available in 71.8% of urban facilities against 16.0% of rural ones, and in 83.6% of Greater Accra facilities against 20.1% in the Eastern Region. Overall readiness scores, which combine staff, guidelines, equipment and medicines, were 45.5% for hypertension, 50.6% for diabetes and 44.2% for mental health. At CHPS compounds, mean readiness for hypertension medicines was only 1.6%.
Thirteen national policy documents already call for stronger non-communicable disease care in primary clinics. The findings show that policy intent has not yet been matched by medicines, trained staff and equipment in many of the clinics ordinary patients use, especially in rural and lower-tier facilities in these two regions.
Research Scope
This article is based on a 2026 peer-reviewed journal article in BMC Primary Care by researchers linked to the Ghana College of Physicians and Surgeons, the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Ashesi University, the Ghana Health Service and other partners, held in UGSpace at the University of Ghana. It combines a desk review of 13 national policy documents with a WHO Service Availability and Readiness Assessment survey of 207 primary health care facilities in the Greater Accra and Eastern Regions, carried out between October 2023 and February 2024. It is a research signal from a sample of two regions, not a full national survey, and readiness scores do not measure whether equipment and guidelines are used day to day.