Prenatal therapy for fetal cardiac disorders

Abstract

Fetal cardiac abnormalities are some of the commonest congenital disorders seen in prenatal life. They can be anatomical or functional and can develop de novo or as a consequence of either maternal or fetal disease. Untreated, morbidity and mortality rates are high for hypoplastic left heart disorders and for some fetal tachy and bradyarrhythmias. Optimum management strategies are often not clear because of the lack of knowledge about the precise natural history of some of these conditions. Prenatal therapy ranges from invasive fetal cardiac intervention to maternal administration of drugs for transplacental transfer to the fetus. This comprehensive review covers many fetal cardiac disorders and various prenatal therapeutic options that are available.

Keywords:

• Fetal cardiac intervention
• fetal dysrhythmias
• hypoplastic left heart syndrome
• aortic stenosis
• pulmonary stenosis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.