Complicated grief and its relationship to mental health and well-being among Bosnian refugees after resettlement in the United States: Implications for practice, policy, and research.

This study investigates mental health and well-being variables in a randomly selected sample of Bosnian refugees. The sample was predominately female (56%), with a mean age of 42, and 56.5% were educated at 12 years of school or less with 43.5% reporting more than 12 years of education. Four standardized research instruments that measured trauma exposure, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptomatology, complicated grief, anxiety, depression, well-being, and general mental health (a combined measure of well-being and psychological distress) were randomly disseminated among 500 Bosnian refugees with 126 (25%) surveys returned. Results revealed PTSD (66.6%), complicated grief (54%), anxiety (40%), and depression (31%) symptoms in the clinical range. A sequential regression revealed that 31% of the variance in poor general mental health was accounted for by complicated grief, whereas PTSD symptomatology only accounted for 6% of the variance. Implications for mental health interventions, research, and policy are discussed.