Ventriculomegaly in the fetus - what is it?

Ventriculomegaly in the fetus is a pathology that occurs in the ventricular system, while the size of the lateral ventricles of the brain increases , but the head itself does not increase. With this disease, the size of the lateral ventricles, or rather their width, can reach 15 mm.

Ventriculomegaly in the fetus can be both completely isolated and can be combined with other known anomalies. It can also be one of the components of chromosomal abnormalities and multiple malformations.

During the research it was found that if there is isolated ventriculomegaly in the fetus, then the probability of occurrence of chromosomal abnormalities is much lower if it occurs together with other changes. Also the frequency of manifestation of the chromosomal abnormality directly depends on the width of the lateral ventricles, with their decrease the probability of detection becomes higher.

During the scientific research it was established that the frequency of this disease is about 0.6%. Ventriculomegaly in the fetus is diagnosed usually at 17-34 weeks of gestation. Also, the dependence of chromosomal abnormalities is established in connection with the patient's age, in young pregnant women she meets three times less often than those who are over 35 years old.

Thus, it has now been established that for the diagnosis of ventriculomegaly in the fetus, it is not sufficient to perform ultrasound examination alone, it is necessary to carry out karyotyping of the fetus.

In the case of a screening ultrasound, the magnitude of the lateral ventricles of the brain, at which the given disease is determined, should be 10 mm. In many cases, ventriculomegaly is not detected in the early stages of pregnancy, and its diagnosis is possible around the end of the 2nd - early 3rd trimester. Usually the average time at which it is possible to accurately diagnose this abnormality is within 26 weeks of pregnancy.

When carrying out the echography, the accuracy of prenatal diagnosis of ventriculomegaly is about 80%. False positive results are about 9% of all cases of examinations.

Usually, a doctor who performs prenatal diagnostics has difficulties in predicting the development of a child who had an isolated ventriculomegaly in prenatal state. Such cases are called mild isolated ventriculomegaly. The normal development of children with this anomaly is about 80%.

The mortality rate for this disease is on average about 14%. About 80% of children have normal further development, 8% have mild deviations and about 10% are cases of gross neurologic disorders.

Ventriculomegaly in newborns does not allow to give an exactly favorable prognosis for the further development of the child. Such forecasting should be done very carefully, while conducting a study and analysis of all the results obtained. Ventriculomegaly in the newborn allows to give a positive prognosis only if there are no associated malformations in the child, normal karyotype is present, and there is no dynamics in increasing the width of the lateral ventricles of the brain and their width does not exceed 15 mm. Some experts believe that it is a one-sided process that can cause more serious neurological disorders in the development of the child.

It is possible to carry out treatment of ventriculomegaly in the prenatal period by carrying out therapeutic physical training. It is carried out in two stages, first during 20 days, exercise therapy is performed and antihypoxants are taken, and in the second period of treatment only exercise therapy is performed, with emphasis on dynamic and static loads for the pelvis involving the muscles of the bottom. In the presence of ventriculomegaly in the fetus, the treatment can be started when the lateral ventricles reach the size of 12 mm.