ABSTRACT
Maternal-fetal surgery is a specialty born of clinical necessity; a congenital defect alters normal development and causes irreversible organ damage before birth, leading to prenatal or neonatal death. The compelling rationale for maternal-fetal surgery is to restore normal development by correcting the defect before birth. Improvements in fetal imaging and serial clinical observation have allowed better definition of fetal pathophysiology, and better prediction of which fetuses might benefit from prenatal intervention. Because of the potential maternal risk, maternal-fetal surgery has historically been reserved for fetal disorders deemed to have a high probability of causing fetal or neonatal death. Recently, however, the success of the Management of Myelomeningocele Study (MOMS) in reducing the neurologic morbidity associated with myelomeningocele (MMC) has expanded the potential application of maternal-fetal surgery to nonlethal conditions.
