A systematic scoping review on the impact of the COVID-19 quarantine on the psychological wellbeing of medical students

Objectives

The goal of this study was to identify the nature and extent of the available published research on the impact of social isolation, on the psychological wellbeing of medical students, who had to quarantine due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Design

Scoping review.

Search strategy

The PRISMA-ScR (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic reviews and Meta-Analyses extension for Scoping Reviews), guideline, was used to structure this study. A search strategy was carried out across six bibliographic databases. PubMed, Embase, ERIC, Scopus, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews and Web of Science. The following search terms were used, “medical student*” AND “impact” AND “quarantine” AND “COVID-19”. Searches were confined to articles published (excluding conference abstracts) between 1 January 2019-21 August 2021. A search of secondary references was conducted. Data from the selected studies were extracted, and the following variables recorded; first author and year of publication, country of study, study design, sample size, focus group, mode of analyzing impact of quarantine from COVID-19 on mental health and results of the studies.

Results

A total of 223 articles were identified across the six databases, from which 69 duplicates were excluded resulting in 154 full-text articles. Of these, 29 met the inclusion criteria. Following a review of the abstracts of these 29, ten full-text articles were identified all of which were cross sectional studies. Sample sizes ranged from 182 to 860 students and all studies used a variety of self-administered questionnaires to measure psychological wellbeing. Eight of the 10 articles showed that quarantine had a negative impact on the psychological well-being of medical students.

Conclusion

The evidence is small but growing. Quarantine because of the COVID-19 pandemic appears to have had a negative impact on the psychological wellbeing of medical students. There is a need for more studies to further evaluate this research question.

Article summary

Strengths and limitations of this study.

• This was the first scoping review as far as we know of the literature in this area.

• Many of the studies analysed in this review were cross-sectional in nature.

• A variety of measurement tools were used to assess psychological wellbeing, preventing comparison of results and data synthesis.

• Many of the studies included in the review did not include a control group of medical students, pre-COVID-19 quarantine.

• A detailed critical appraisal of the studies included was not conducted, however this is not mandatory for scoping reviews.