Ventriculomegaly in the fetus is a pathology that occurs in the ventricular system, while the sizes of the lateral ventricles of the brain increase , 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 either a completely isolated defect, or it 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 likelihood of chromosomal abnormalities is much lower if it occurs together with other changes. Also, the frequency of manifestation of a chromosomal abnormality directly depends on the width of the lateral ventricles, with their decrease the probability of detection becomes higher.
When conducting scientific research, it was found that the frequency of this disease is about 0.6%. Ventriculomegaly in the fetus is usually diagnosed at 17-34 weeks of gestation. The dependence of chromosomal abnormalities in connection with the patient’s age has also been established; in young pregnant women, it occurs three times less than in 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 enough just to conduct an ultrasound scan, there is a need for karyotyping of the fetus.
In the case of a screening ultrasound examination, the size of the lateral ventricles of the brain, at which this disease is determined, should be from 10 mm. In many cases, ventriculomegaly is not detected in the early stages of pregnancy, and its diagnosis is possible approximately at the end of 2 - beginning of 3 trimesters. Usually, the average period at which it is possible to accurately diagnose this anomaly is within 26 weeks of pregnancy.
When performing ultrasound, the accuracy of prenatal diagnosis of ventriculomegaly is about 80%. False positive results are in the order of 9% of all cases of surveys.
Usually, a doctor who performs prenatal diagnosis has difficulty predicting the development of a child who has an isolated ventriculomegaly in the antenatal state. Such cases are called moderate isolated ventriculomegaly. The normal development of children with such an anomaly is about 80%.
Mortality in this disease averages about 14%. About 80% of children have normal further development, 8% have moderate deviations and about 10% are cases of gross neurological disorders.
Ventriculomegaly in newborns does not allow to give an accurately favorable prognosis of the further development of the child. Such forecasting must be done very carefully, while studying and analyzing all the results obtained. Ventriculomegaly in a newborn allows you to give a positive prognosis only if there are no combined malformations in the child, there is a normal karyotype, and there is also no dynamics in the increase in 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 treat ventriculomegaly in the prenatal period with therapeutic physical culture. It is carried out in two stages, first exercise therapy is carried out for 20 days and antihypoxic drugs are taken, and only exercise therapy is performed on the second treatment period, with the emphasis being on dynamic and static loads for the pelvis involving the muscles of the bottom. If the fetus has ventriculomegaly, treatment can be started when the size of the lateral ventricles reaches about 12 mm.