Is a five-step approach to fetal echocardiography feasible throughout pregnancy?

The purpose of this study was to determine whether gestational age impacted on the length of time required to obtain or identify (not scrutinize) views of the fetal heart considered essential for a complete examination. Fetal heart studies were performed in pregnancies of 60 patients who were recruited prospectively. These patients were placed in three gestational age groups. A 5-step approach to fetal echocardiography was formulated for study purposes and included imaging of cardiac structures considered essential for a complete examination. Data were analyzed by Duncan ANOVA and Pearson correlation coefficient. Among the three gestational age groups, there were no significant differences in the length of time needed to obtain views that comprised the 5-step approach. In this study the time needed to scrutinize each view for normality was excluded. Furthermore, there was no correlation between gestational age and the length of time taken to obtain all essential cardiac views. The presence of factors cited to be hindrances to fetal heart examination was not associated with prolongation of time needed to identify essential views of the heart when a 5-step approach was utilized throughout pregnancy.