Intrauterine Therapie bei fetalen Herzfehlern

The life-threatening effects of therapy-refractory fetal arrhythmias, severe semilunar valve obstructions as well as other rare congenital cardiac malformations have inspired the development of various experimental prenatal treatment approaches in animal and human studies. Some of these novel fetal cardiac interventions are currently under clinical evaluation by a few centers. They may not only serve as potentially lifesaving treatment approaches but also improve postnatal quality of life and the prognosis in selected patients. Following an adequate learning curve supervised by ethics committees, the overall outcome and quality of postnatal life of the treated neonates will ultimately determine whether fetal cardiac interventions will become better therapeutic alternatives to currently available postnatal procedures. The aim of this article is to provide the interested reader with a short and critical appraisal of these novel therapeutic approaches.