The use of housing as leverage to increase adherence to psychiatric treatment in the community

For people with mental disorder, access to subsidized housing may be used as "leverage" to obtain adherence to treatment. Interview data from 200 outpatients at each of five sites provided the first national description of the use of housing as leverage. Results indicated that housing is most likely to be used as leverage when it is "special" housing, available only to people with mental illness. Most frequently, respondents state that the requirement that they participate in treatment is imposed by their landlord, rather than by a clinician. The use of housing as leverage strongly increases respondents' perceptions of coercion. Despite this, however, participants who experience housing as leverage are no less satisfied than other participants with the treatment that they receive, and are much more likely than other participants to believe that using housing as leverage is effective in helping people stay well.