Introduction: It is necessary to understand that psychological reactions after a natural disaster are as complex as disaster itself. Following a catastrophic earthquake like Bam’s, such reactions can be seen in nursing team members as well.

Materials and Methods: This study is a descriptive cross sectional analytic research, conducted with cooperation of Japanese Nursing Association to identify somatic and psychological problems of nursing team members of Bam. A total of 92 members of nursing team affiliated to healthcare centers of Bam were studied. Data collection tools were 2 questionnaires first for evaluating demographic characteristics and general health and second- questionnaire of Goldberg and Williams- for evaluation of four domains of psychosomatic problems, anxiety and insomnia, psychosocial functioning and severe depression. Each domain contained seven questions, each scored from 0 to 3 based on Likert score. Complete score of general health was 0-84. Scores were classified in four groups: 0-20 as optimal, 21-4 as approximately optimal, 41-6 as approximately suboptimal and 61 and higher as suboptimal.

Results: One year after the earthquake, evaluation of general health of nursing team members showed 30.3% of subjects had optimal psychosomatic status, 34.8% had moderate problems of anxiety and insomnia, 40.2% had approximately optimal psychosocial functioning and 44.2% of subjects were not severely depressed. Overall, 38.4% of nursing team members had approximately optimal general health.

Conclusion: This study showed that following a catastrophic earthquake, most of the victims suffer from several psychological and somatic reactions. In addition to on time rescue procedures, other important allaying factors are cultural and religious values and believing in God.

  Background & Aim : Childhood cancer discloses family, and mother in particular, to a number of challenges. It consumes a lot of time, energy, and money of parents to fulfill their caring responsibilities. In some cases and along with increase of caring pressure, mental health of parents deteriorates. The vesting consequences of such events may alter the process of children caring and their quality of life (QoL). The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between mother’s general health status with the QoL of the child diagnosed with cancer.

  Methods & Materials : In this descriptive cross-sectional study, 124 mothers of children diagnosed with cancer and aged 6-14 years old, referred to Imam Reza and Amir Hospitals in Shiraz during a four month period (from early November to late February) were selected to the study. Data were gathered using the following instruments: 1) the questionnaire of factors related to QoL in children 2) mother's general health status form 3) TNO_AZL Children Quality of Life (TACQOL) and 4) Ped QL Cancer Module. Data were collected through interviewing with mothers and reviewing the medical records of the hospitals. Data were analyzed using the Kruskal–Wallis, Spearman correlation coefficient, Mann-whiteny test and logistic regression in the SPSS-19.

  Results: : A few number of mothers (7.3%) reported good general health status and a large number described their general health status as moderate (55.6%) and poor (37.1%). The mean of health related QoL score and the specific QoL score for children were 78.45±10.05 and 65.51±17.54, respectively. According to the multi-factorial logistic regression, demographic and social factors such as child’s age and treatment-related factors including the period of radiotherapy, along with the duration of disease were more correlated with health and specific QoL scores in children, compared to the mothers’ general health status score.

  Conclusion : Results from this study suggested that emotional support is as important as financial empowerment. The QoL in these patients and their families may improve by identifying the families who are at risk of mental problems.