The Prevalence and Treatment Options of Melasma as Well as its Association with Quality of Life in Darker Skin Types: A Scoping Review Protocol

BackgroundMelasma is one of the most encountered dermatoses in dermatology and skin care clinics. It is a challenging chronic, recurrent condition associated with hyperpigmentation. Its etiology is poorly understood. Melasma affects all races and gender but is more prevalent in women with darker skin types. Being a facial lesion, melasma has a severe impact on quality of life due to its disfigurement. While many modalities of treatment for melasma exists, unfortunately, effectiveness and safety remain a huge concern. Treatment modalities are variable and often unsatisfactory. The objective of this scoping review is to systemically map available evidence from literature regarding melasma, garner insight as to how melasma affects the quality of life and begin to investigate and gain understanding on effectiveness of different treatments used for melasma.MethodsA scoping review guided by Arksey and O’Malley’s framework, the enhancements and recommendations of Levac, Colquhoun and O’Brien, Daudt and associates and the 2015 Johanna Briggs Institute’s guidelines will be conducted. Systematic electronic searches of databases and search engines such as, Scopus, PubMed, CINAHL Complete, Cochrane, Science Direct, and Web of Science will be conducted to attain published peer-reviewed articles of all study designs excluding reviews. All literature that meets the inclusion criteria, research question and sub-question will be included in this review. All the retrieved literature will be exported to an Endnote X20 library. Quality appraisal of the included articles will be conducted using the mixed methods appraisal tool (MMAT) 2018 version.DiscussionWe anticipate mapping relevant literature on the prevalence of melasma, investigating the effectiveness of treatment options of melasma as well as evaluating its association with quality of life in darker skin types. This study is likely to reveal research gaps, which could guide future implementation research on melasma treatment interventions.Protocol registration: This protocol has been registered apriori with OSF and is accessible on this link: https://osf.io/ru3jc/