Hair Dye Penetration in Monkeys and Human Beings

Abstract

The safety of hair dyes in human use is unknown. To address this, the penetration of hair dyes into human bodies must be quantified. This chapter provides a critical summary to update work published in the area of in vivo hair dye penetration in humans. Studies are in humans, with one including rhesus monkey and one including in vitro human skin. MEDLINE, PubMed, Embase, Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar databases were searched from 2004 to October 2019 for articles with experimental methodology on in vivo percutaneous absorption of hair dyes in humans and four additional studies are included. Findings indicate that percutaneous penetration occurs with hair dye use. However, much remains unknown about the penetration of the over 200 commercially available hair dyes. A major void exists in data confirming or denying the completeness of excretion once absorbed.