92 THE EFFECT OF ART GARDEN PAINTING INTERVENTION ON SYMPTOM IMPROVEMENT IN MILD SCHIZOPHRENIA PATIENTS
Authors: Zhao Yuhang 
Published: February 2025

Abstract

Background
Mild schizophrenia is a subtype of schizophrenia, whose symptoms are relatively mild compared to schizophrenia, but still impose significant psychological and economic burdens on patients and their families. The current treatment method used is drug therapy, but the effectiveness of a single drug therapy is limited. In recent years, art garden painting intervention has gradually been applied as an emerging form of art therapy in the treatment of mental illnesses. The study aims to explore the improvement effect of art garden painting intervention on the symptoms of mild schizophrenia patients.

Methods
A study recruited 86 patients diagnosed with mild schizophrenia at a psychiatric hospital, with 43 males and 43 females. The study randomly divided all patients into an experimental group and a control group, with equal gender ratios in each group. Among them, the control group patients only received treatment with povidone, with an initial dosage of 1 mg/d, gradually increasing the dosage to 2 mg/d-4 mg/d. The experimental group added artistic garden painting intervention on this basis, participating in an artistic garden painting activity once a week for 1.5 hours. Choose a garden environment with natural landscapes as the activity venue. Under the guidance of the mentor, patients can freely draw and create using paper, paint, and brushes to express their emotions. The intervention lasted for 10 weeks, and before and after the intervention, the quality of life of the two groups of patients was compared using a quality of life scale.

Results
The quality of life scores of the two groups of patients before and after the experiment are shown in Figure 1. As shown in Figure 1 (a), the scores of the experimental group patients in various fields were significantly improved before and after treatment. Among them, in the physiological field, the scores before and after treatment were 9.97 ± 0.68 points and 11.21 ± 0.71 points, respectively, and the difference between the two was statistically significant (P&lt;0.05). From Figure 1 (b), it can be seen that the control group showed little improvement in various scores before and after the experiment, with only significant improvements in the physiological and environmental domains. There were no statistically significant differences in other indicators (P&gt;0.05). In addition, in the inter group comparison, there were statistically significant differences (P&lt;0.05) in the scoring results of the two groups in various fields after the intervention.

Discussion
The experimental results indicate that the intervention of art garden painting combined with drug therapy can significantly improve the quality of life of patients with mild schizophrenia, including physiological, psychological, social, and environmental aspects. The reason is that art garden painting combines artistic creation with the healing effect of the natural environment, emphasizing the release of patients’ inner emotions through creative activities and improving their quality of life. Future research can further explore the intervention effects of this therapy on other mental illnesses.