For Professionals

In many areas in medicine, the use of checklists, time-outs and algorithms has improved the quality of care. Similarly, the use of a systematic approach to fetal cardiac imaging is associated with more complete and reliable assessment of fetal anatomy. This leads to a higher rate of prenatal detection of major cardiac anomalies, which benefits the families and infants affected. A stepwise method of fetal heart examination allows the sonographer to be more deliberate in assessing details that might be otherwise overlooked. Following a sequence of views helps train the eye to recognize the moment when a view “just doesn’t look right.” For cardiac screening, this is the crucial moment of discovery that can alter this fetus’s life forever.