Ventriculo-amniotic shunting for severe fetal ventriculomegaly

Severe fetal cerebral ventriculomegaly, observed in about 1 in 1000 newborns, is associated with a high risk of perinatal death and neurodevelopmental delay in survivors. The objective of this study was to evaluate the efficiency of ventriculo-amniotic shunting for drainage of severe fetal cerebral ventriculomegaly and the neurodevelopment of survivors at the age of 2 years.

This was a retrospective study of 44 fetuses with severe bilateral ventriculomegaly treated with ventriculo-amniotic shunting in a tertiary fetal therapy center between 2010 and 2015.

Shunt insertion was successfully carried out at a median gestational age of 25 weeks (range 20-33 weeks). There were three fetal deaths within 24 hours of the procedure and 41 live births at a median gestational age of 37 weeks (range 28-39 weeks). Neurodevelopment at 2 years of age was evaluated using the Bayley scale in the 38 survivors. In the 27 cases with isolated ventriculomegaly 19 (70.4%; 95% confidence interval [95% CI] 51.5%-84.2%) had normal or mild neurodevelopmental delay and 8 (29.6%; 95% CI 15.6%-48.5%) were moderately or severely delayed. In the 11 with non-isolated ventriculomegaly 2 (18.2%; 95% CI 5.1%-4.8%) had normal or mild neurodevelopmental delay and 9 (81.8%; 95% CI 52.3%-94.9%) babies were moderately or severely delayed.

Ventriculo-amniotic shunting is an option for the management of severe ventriculomegaly and results in normalization of the ventricular diameter. However, a high proportion of survivors have neurodevelopmental delay and the possible beneficial effect of ventriculo-amniotic shunting needs to be assessed by randomized studies.