Family Social Capital, A Missing Link in Understanding the lived Experiences of Women suffering from cancer

Despite a wide range of documents, articles, and circles that increasingly cite "social capital" as a way to promote the health, family social capital is a missing link in cancer studies. Women suffering from cancer find an important part of their life meaning in lived family relationships. In this study, a qualitative approach with an emphasis on interpretive phenomenological method was used to understand the perception and lived experience of women suffering from cancer and their families of mutual norms in family ties. Field data were collected using interview techniques and data saturation criteria. The respondednts included women with cancer referred to Omid Hospital in Urmia and a family member who accompanies them to the treatment center. Analysis and coding of data show that some themes such as the break in the structure of family social capital (first mother, then wife) and the negative social capital in the participants' experiences indicate how social capital within the family has adversely affected the health of women with cancer. The themes of silence / protest, cohesion in emergency situation, and hidden mediation suggest that social capital is reciprocally affected by the disease and it can somehow be strengthened by it.Keywords: Family social capital, positive social capital, negative social capital, lived experience