Search

Background: Congenital Heart Disease represents the most frequent fetal malformation. The lack of prenatal identification of congenital heart defects can have adverse consequences for the neonate, while a correct prenatal diagnosis of specific cardiac anomalies improves neonatal care neurologic and surgery outcomes. Sonographers perform prenatal diagnosis manually during the first or second-trimester scan, but the reported detection rates are low. This project's primary objective is to develop an Intelligent Decision Support System that uses two-dimensional video files of cardiac sweeps obtained during the standard first-trimester fetal echocardiography (FE) to signal the presence/absence of previously learned key features. Methods: The cross-sectional study will be divided into a training part of the machine learning approaches and the testing phase on previously unseen frames and eventually on actual video scans. Pregnant women in their 12–13 + 6 weeks of gestation admitted for routine first-trimester anomaly scan will be consecutively included in a two-year study, depending on the availability of the experienced sonographers in early fetal cardiac imaging involved in this research. The Data Science / IT department (DSIT) will process the key planes identified by the sonographers in the two- dimensional heart cine loop sweeps: four-chamber view, left and right ventricular outflow tracts, three vessels, and trachea view. The frames will be grouped into the classes representing the plane views, and then different state-of-the- art deep-learning (DL) pre-trained algorithms will be tested on the data set. The sonographers will validate all the intermediary findings at the frame level and the meaningfulness of the video labeling. Discussion: FE is feasible and efficient during the first trimester. Still, the continuous training process is impaired by the lack of specialists or their limited availability. Therefore, in our study design, the sonographer benefits from a second opinion provided by the developed software, which may be very helpful, especially if a more experienced colleague is unavailable. In addition, the software may be implemented on the ultrasound device so that the process could take place during the live examination. Trial registration: The study is registered under the name „Learning deep architectures for the Interpretation of Fetal Echocardiography (LIFE)", project number 408PED/2020, project code PN-III-P2–2.1-PED-2019. Trial registration: ClinicalTrials.gov, unique identifying number NCT05090306, date of registration 30.10.2020. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The advantages of earlier diagnosis give the family more time to adjust to the fetal cardiac and related extracardiac diagnoses and to make informed pregnancy decisions. If a severe fetal CHD is detected in the first trimester and pregnancy termination is selected, the intervention may have a lower risk for the mother's physical and mental health. Training medical staff is a crucial part of implementing obstetric ultrasonography services well, since effective patient care depends on their ability to use the equipment skillfully and interpret results properly. In many low-and middle-income nations, there is a scarcity of healthcare professionals trained to offer ultrasound services and one of the reasons for this issue is the lack of available lectures, simulations and instruments to explain how ultrasound sections are acquired. We propose an alternative method of visualizing the ultrasound planes of interest using three-dimensional volumes of fetal hearts reconstructed from seriate histological slices. This method may aid trainees in understanding echocardiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

CONGENITAL HEART DEFECTS (CHDs) ARE FOUND IN UP 1% OF ALL PREGNANCIES. THE PRENATAL DIAGNOSIS OF CHDs PLAYS AN IMPORTANT ROLE IN THE MANAGEMENT OF THE DISEASE AFTER BIRTH, THIS VAST PATHOLOGY IS RESPONSIBLE FOR HIGH MORBIDITY AND MORTALITY RATES AMONG NEONATES AND INFANTS. THE FIRST TRIMESTER(FT) ANOMALY SCAN AT 11+0 to 13+6 GESTATIONAL WEEKS OFFERS TIME FOR THE FETAL CARDIOLOGIST AND FOR THE PARENTS TO OPT FOR MORE INVESTIGATIONS, SUCH AS GENETIC TESTING AND EXTENSIVE ULTRASOUND EVALUATION BEFORE THE DECIDE THE COURSE OF THE PREGNANCY. EXTENSIVE FT SCANNING PROTOCOLS ARE IMPLEMENTED IN SOME NATIONAL HEALTH SERVICES TO ALL OR IN HIGH RISK PREGNANCY. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Correction: Learning deep architectures for the interpretation of first-trimester fetal echocardiography (LIFE) - a study protocol for developing an automated intelligent decision support system for early fetal echocardiography The online version of the original article can be found at https://doi.org/10.1186/s12884-022-05204-x B Correction: BMC Pregnancy Childbirth 23, 20 (2023) b https://doi.org/10.1186/s12884-022-05204-x Following publication of the original article [[1]], the authors identified an error in the author names. Learning deep architectures for the interpretation of first-trimester fetal echocardiography (LIFE) - a study protocol for developing an automated intelligent decision support system for early fetal echocardiography. [Extracted from the article]