Community-Acquired AKI in Asia: An Update.

Community-acquired acute kidney injury (CA-AKI) is the dominant form of AKI encountered in developing countries in Asia. Economic disparities, variations in access to health care services, geographic conditions, environmental risk factors, and sociocultural circumstances shape the causes and outcomes of CA-AKI. Infections, drugs, plant and chemical toxins, envenomations, and obstetric complications are common causes of CA-AKI. Previously healthy young individuals who often work outdoors in fields or farms are exposed to a wide variety of work-related or environmental risk factors for CA-AKI. Improving disease definitions, better data, and evolving host-pathogen interactions have changed disease descriptions and presentations over the past 20 years. Among infections, although the incidence of malaria has decreased, the number of cases with dengue and scrub typhus have increased sharply. The recognition of AKI in relation to Plasmodium knowlesi, Plasmodium vivax, scrub typhus, and leptospirosis in areas not traditionally considered at risk, association of infections with the future development of chronic kidney disease, and the role of complement dysregulation in infection-associated AKI are important new findings. Snake-bite-related toxic envenomation continues to be an important cause of AKI in some counties and is a neglected public health problem. On the other hand, significant decreases in the incidence of AKI related to acute diarrheal illness or obstetric causes are signs of hope. Coordinated efforts between administrative stakeholders, society, and health care delivery services at all levels have the potential to propel research and improve outcomes in CA-AKI.