• Fateme Mohammadi, Khodayar Oshvandi, Farshid Shamsaei, Fateme Cheraghi, Masoud Khodaveisi, and Mostafa Bijani.
• Chronic Diseases(Home Care) Research Center and Autism Spectrum Disorders Research Center, School of Nursing and Midwifery, Department of Nursing, Hamadan University of Medical Sciences, Hamadan, Iran.
• Bmc Fam Pract. 2021 May 15; 22 (1): 9494.

BackgroundThe bereaved families of COVID-19 victims are among the most vulnerable social groups in the COVID-19 pandemic. This highly infectious and contagious disease has afflicted these families with numerous psychological crises which have not been studied much yet. The present study is an attempt at investigating the psychological challenges and issues which the families of COVID-19 victims are faced with. The present study aims to identify the Mental Health crises which the families of COVID-19 deceased victims are going through.MethodsA qualitative research, the present study uses a conventional content analysis design. The participants were 16 members of the families of COVID-19 victims selected from medical centers in Iran from February to May 2020 via purposeful sampling. Sampling continued to the point of data saturation Data were collected via semi-structured individual interviews conducted online. The collected data were analyzed according to the conventional qualitative content analysis approach.ResultsAnalyses of the data yielded two main themes and seven categories. Emotional shock included (feelings of guilt and rumination, bitter farewell, strange burial and concern about unreligious burial), and fear of the future included (instability in the family, lack of job security and difficult financial conditions, Stigmatization and complications in social interactions).ConclusionThe families of COVID-19 deceased victims are affected by various psychological crises which have exposed them to a deep sense of loss and emotional shock. Therefore, there is an urgent need for a cultural context which recognizes and supports all the various aspects of the mental health of these families.

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