Fig. 1

This figure indicates a flow diagram of the controlled trial procedure. One hundred and thirty-four out of 650 approached patients with schizophrenia spectrum disorders were recruited from two community psychiatric nursing service units (i.e., 67 participants in each setting). After informed consent and baseline measurement, they were randomly assigned into either adherence therapy (plus usual care, n = 67) or treatment as usual alone (n = 67) group. Following 3-month intervention, the participants completed the post-test outcome measurements at 2 weeks, 6 months and 18 months follow-up. With an attrition of totally 6 participants, outcome data of 65 in adherence therapy and 63 in treatment as usual group were finally analysed and compared