Abstract: Objective To explore the influencing factors of medical students' attitude towards death,provide reference for medical colleges to carry out death education. Methods PubMed,Web of Science,Scopus,China National Knowledge Network,VIP and Wanfang databases were searched for Chinese and English articles on the influencing factors of medical students' attitude toward death from January 2012 to September 2022. RevMan5.4 was used for meta-analysis. Results A total of 17 literatures were included,with a sample size of 11 251 people. The results of meta-analysis showed that death of a relative[SMD（95%CI）：0.10（0.04-0.17）],family discussion of death[SMD（95%CI）：0.16（0.10-0.22）] and death education[SMD（95%CI）：-0.22（-0.36- -0.09）] was the influential factor of "fear of death" of medical students. Talking about death at home[SMD（95%CI）：0.25（0.15-0.35）],experiences of exposure to death[SMD（95%CI）：-0.11（-0.20--0.02）] and death education[SMD（95%CI）：-0.23（-0.36- -0.09）] were the influential factor of "death escape" of medical students. The gender[SMD（95%CI）：-0.06（-0.12--0.01）],grade[SMD（95%CI）：0.14（0.02-0.26）] and origin of students[SMD（95%CI）：-0.13（-0.17--0.08）] were the influential factor of "naturally acceptance" of medical students. The major[SMD（95%CI）：0.08（0.01-0.15）],perceived physical and mental status[SMD（95%CI）：0.28（0.19-0.36）] and experience of death of relatives and friends[SMD（95%CI）：0.16（0.09-0.22）] were the influencing factors of "approach acceptance" of medical students. The experience of death of relatives and friends[SMD（95%CI）：0.14（0.01-0.27）] and death education[SMD（95%CI）：-0.14（-0.23--0.04）] were the influential factors of "escape acceptance" of medical students. There were statistically significant differences in the above factors（all P<0.05）. Conclusion The medical students who have experienced the death of relatives and friends,who have not been exposed to the death experience,who have never or try to avoid talking about death at home,and who have not received death education are more likely to have a negative attitude towards death. Therefore,the above factors should be taken into account in the education of death for medical students.

Key words: Medical students, Attitude towards death, Influencing factors, Meta-analysis