Background: Gamification is the process of game thinking and game mechanics to attract learners and solve problems. It is a unique growing phenomenon in education and training programs. Educational games, by application of game design and game elements in learning environments, motivate students to learn and improve the teaching and learning process. Herein, this scoping review presents an overview of the theoretical underpinnings of gamification that is crucial in understanding the theoretical pillar of successful educational games.Methods: This scoping review follows Arksey and O'Malley's stages of scoping review. In this review, the gamification in medical education articles that implicitly or explicitly presented underpinning learning theories of gamification in medical education was retrieved. So, keywords such as gamification, learning theories, higher education, and medical education were searched in Scopus, PubMed, WEB OF SCIENCE, EMBASE, ERIC, and Cochrane Library from 1998 to March 2019.Results: The search indicated 5416 articles which were narrowed down by title and abstract relatedness. 464 articles entered the second phase of the study and after reviewing their full text, finally, 10 articles which were explicitly and implicitly reported the underpinning learning theories remained.Conclusion: Gamification is a strategy using game design techniques for non-game experiences for more effective learning and provides a more attractive environment for teaching and learning. Designing gamification based on learning theories (behavioral, cognitive, and constructivist), makes them more efficient, and the application of learning theories in designing gamification is recommended.

Background: A training course on burn infection and care is one of the courses that medical students take during their internship. This training course has not yet been taught through e-learning in medical schools in Iran. Therefore, this study aimed to compare the effects of two methods: traditional lecturing and employing a vid-cast with interactive electronic content, on the knowledge of interns in a training course on burns. Methods: This quasi-experimental study with a pre-post non-equivalent group design was conducted among medical interns taking burn rotation training courses at the Motahari burn hospital, affiliated with the Iran University of Medical Sciences. The two groups were given a pre-test at the beginning of the course. One group was given in-person lectures, and the other was given the same content in the form of a vid-cast with interactive electronic files. At the end of the rotation course, a post-test was administered on the planned content, and scores of both groups were compared. Results: The pre-test mean scores in the lecture group before and after the training intervention were 8 and 14.2, respectively; this difference was significant (P<0.001). The difference between the pre-test and post-test mean scores in the vid-cast group was also significant (P<0.001).The mean of post-test scores in the lecture group was 14.92 and 17.24 in the e-learning group; this difference was also significant (P<0.001). Conclusion: Post-test scores in the e-learning group were higher with a significant statistical difference, suggesting that the e-learning outperformed their counterparts in the traditional lecture model. It is recommended that e-learning be used either as a supplementary or the main method of training in burn infection and care for interns.