Impact and Problems of Fetal Echocardiography: A Single-Institution Study in Japan

The purpose of this study was to assess the current status of prenatal diagnosis and the benefit of fetal echocardiography for complex congenital heart disease (CHD) in Kagawa prefecture. We reviewed 152 cases of CHDs who were born between 2012 and 2020 and performed cardiovascular surgery or catheter intervention in our hospital. They were divided into two groups: the fetal diagnosis group (FD) and the no-fetal diagnosis group (nFD). We compared patient data between FD and nFD groups. Of the 152 patients, 63 patients were FD group and 89 patients were nFD group. The fetal detection rate was lower than 40% between 2012 and 2014, its ratio raise to about 50% after 2015. The ratio of poor general conditions at admission was significantly higher in the nFD group (p