Introduction: Due to the social stigma associated with mental illness, to avoid the sigma, individuals with mental illness opt to seek help from variety of sources before eventually accessing professional mental health care. This study investigated the help-seeking behaviours, delays to psychiatric care and the association between help-seeking pattern and sociodemographic characteristics of mentally-ill patients visiting a teaching hospital in Lagos. Methods: A total number of 94 patients seen at the outpatient's clinic of the
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