Introduction Mental health problems among undergraduate medical students are a major global public health concern that emerge early during training and are shaped by demanding educational environments, emotional stressors and organisational pressures. Although research has expanded rapidly, the literature remains fragmented across themes, regions and methods.
This scoping review aims to map the global quantitative literature on medical students' mental health and identify gaps in scope, geography, methodology and equity. Methods and analysis This scoping review will be conducted in accordance with the Joanna Briggs Institute methodological guidance and reported in accordance with PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews) guidelines.
We will include quantitative studies assessing mental health among undergraduate medical students. MEDLINE (Ovid), Web of Science (Clarivate), the Cochrane Library (Wiley) and PsycINFO (Ovid) will be searched without date or language restrictions using a keyword-based search strategy.
Two reviewers will independently screen titles, abstracts and full texts and extract data using a standardised form.
BMJ Open published a clinical update in Research Highlights on 29 May 2026.
The item focuses on Global gaps in how we assess undergraduate medical students mental health: a scoping review protocol.
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