OBJECTIVES: To evaluate the impact of risperidone long-acting injection (RLAI) treatments on hospitalization outcomes for patients participating in the electronic Schizophrenia Treatment Adherence Registry (e-STAR) in Korea. METHODS: e-STAR is an international, long-term, prospective, observational study of patients with schizophrenia who initiate RLAI treatment during their routine clinical management. Hospitalization data were collected retrospectively for 1-year and prospectively every three months for 2 years. Changes in percent of patients hospitalized, number of hospitalizations and number of days in hospital between 6 months prior and 6 months after RLAI initiation were examined.  RESULTS: To date, 162 patients enrolled in e-STAR from Korea, 127 of them who have been followed prospectively for 6 months were included in this interim analysis. Mean age was 36.6±11.0 years old with 52.8% of male and mean time since diagnosis was 8.2±7.1 years. Most frequent reasons for initiating on RLAI were lack of compliance with previous therapy (45.7%) and need for maintenance (25.2%). Mean dose of RLAI was 28.0 mg at baseline and 32.6 mg at 6 months. At 6 months, 76.4% (97 out of 127) still continued on RLAI. Based on intent-to-treat of 127 patients, during the 6 months after starting RLAI treatment as compared to 6 months prior, percent of patients hospitalized, number of hospitalizations and number of days in hospital all significantly decreased; percent patients hospitalized decreased from 29.0% to 6.5% (p<0.001), mean number of hospitalizations decreased from 0.33 to 0.06 (p<0.001) and there was a reduction of 13.5 days in mean number of days in hospital (from 15.6 days to 2.2 days, p<0.001). CONCLUSIONS: This 6-month interim data from Korea show that switch to risperidone long-acting injection treatment was associated with significant reduction in use of hospital care in patients with schizophrenia.