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©The Author(s) 2025. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Nephrol. Dec 25, 2025; 14(4): 112796
Published online Dec 25, 2025. doi: 10.5527/wjn.v14.i4.112796
Published online Dec 25, 2025. doi: 10.5527/wjn.v14.i4.112796
Acute kidney injury induced by topical hair straightening products: A systematic review
Ahmad B Aamir, Department of Medicine, Punjab Medical College, Faisalabad 38800, Punjab, Pakistan
Rabia Latif, Department of Physiology, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Dammam 31441, Saudi Arabia
FNU Sorath, Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Dow University of Public Health, Karachi 74200, Sindh, Pakistan
Subhash Chander, Department of Nephrology and Hypertension, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, MN 55902, United States
Subhash Chander, Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine, Mayo Clinic Rochester, MN 55902, United States
Aamna Latif, Department of Pathology, Pakistan Kidney and Liver Institute and Research Center, Rawalpindi 46000, Punjab, Pakistan
Zubair Rahaman, Department of Medicine, University of Buffalo, New York, NY 14260, United States
Yaqub N Mohammed, Department of Medicine, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, MI 49008, United States
Om Parkash, Department of Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, New York, NY 10467, United States
Poonam Devi, Department of Medicine, Sir Syed College of Medical Sciences for Girls, Karachi 75600, Sindh, Pakistan
Ghala A Hassan, Batool M Alalwan, Department of Medicine, Imam Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Dammam 31441, Saudi Arabia
Author contributions: Aamir AB and Sorath F designed the review protocol, developed the search strategy, and conducted the literature search; Latif R conceived the study, developed the research question, and supervised the overall project; Latif A, Alalwan BM, Hassan GA, and Rahaman Z screened titles, abstracts, and full-text articles for eligibility and extracted data from the included studies; Chander S and Mohammed YN contributed to the interpretation of findings and critically revised the manuscript for important intellectual content; Parkash O and Devi P drafted the initial version of the manuscript and coordinated revisions among all authors. All authors approved the final version of the manuscript, and agree to be accountable for all aspects of the work.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors report no relevant conflicts of interest for this article.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Rabia Latif, PhD, Professor, Department of Physiology, Imam Abdul
Received: August 11, 2025
Revised: October 29, 2025
Accepted: December 11, 2025
Published online: December 25, 2025
Processing time: 139 Days and 14.4 Hours
Revised: October 29, 2025
Accepted: December 11, 2025
Published online: December 25, 2025
Processing time: 139 Days and 14.4 Hours
Core Tip
Core Tip: This systematic review is the first comprehensive synthesis of reported cases linking topical hair-straightening products to acute kidney injury (AKI). Analyzing 36 incidents of AKI in 34 female patients, the current study highlights that topical application of hair straightening chemicals can trigger AKI through mechanisms involving calcium oxalate ne