Ho Chi Minh City doctors perform successful fetal cardiac intervention

Medical teams from Tu Du Hospital and Children's Hospital 1 in Ho Chi Minh City have successfully performed a transuterine fetal cardiac intervention on a 26-week-old fetus. This marks the 15th such procedure conducted in the city and represents the smallest gestational age successfully treated to date.

The 26-year-old mother, originally from Hanoi, was undergoing her third pregnancy when an ultrasound at 23 weeks and 5 days revealed severe congenital heart disease. The fetus suffered from a lack of pulmonary valve orifice with a closed interventricular septum, which blocked blood flow from the right ventricle to the pulmonary artery. This condition posed a high risk of severe right ventricular hypoplasia and postnatal death.

Following three weeks of monitoring and consultation with international experts from Austria and Italy, doctors determined that the “golden window” for intervention was closing. On August 26, a multidisciplinary team consisting of fetal intervention, cardiology, neonatal, anesthesia, and obstetric surgery specialists performed the procedure. Using ultrasound guidance, doctors inserted an 18G needle through the abdominal wall, uterus, and fetal chest to reach the right ventricular outflow tract. They successfully used a balloon to dilate the blocked pulmonary valve, restoring blood flow to the pulmonary artery.