Abstract
BackgroundMental health has become a new focus of public health related to migrants in recent years. There are many contradictions in previous studies on the mental health status of migrant children in China. MethodsPubMed, OVID, ERIC, Web of Knowledge, CNKI, Wan Fang and Chongqing VIP were searched on August 16, 2018. The data were analyzed using SMD and random effect model in Comprehensive Meta-Analysis software. ResultsWe included 11 studies involving 4621 migrant children and 5076 urban children. The mental health of migrant children was worse than that of urban children, as evidenced by total score of Mental Health Test (Standardized Mean Difference, SMD = 0.36, 95% CI 0.21 to 0.59) and seven out eight sub-scales of Mental Health Test (SMD, ranging from 0.24 to 0.37). The results were robust to sensitivity analysis. ConclusionOur study supports the notion that compared with urban counterparts, migrant children had more mental health problems with less public services. Future research should focus on how to improve mental health of migrant children.
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