**Preface**

This Special Issue is dedicated to fetal and maternal surveillance during pegancy and manuscripts comprise a wide range of topics from fetal to maternal medicine.

Fetal medicine is a complex undertaking that involves a multidisciplinary team for prenatal diagnosis and fetal therapy. Several issues, including ethical and legal considerations, are particular to fetal medicine; fetal treatment centers may provide solutions to some of these.

Advanced ultrasound sonography has allowed not only for more detailed examinations of the anatomy but also for cardiovascular and other organ function in the fetus. Sonography and genetic analysis also enable prenatal diagnosis to be carried out through accessing the fetus for selected therapies in utero. In the beginning, these treatments were limited to lethal diseases. However, certain diseases leading to severe disability have also become indications for in utero treatment in recent years. Extensive studies are dedicated to looking for proper therapies to ameliorate these diseases. Today, different strategies have been scientifically evaluated to treat fetal tissue directly or administrate substances through maternal blood indirectly. Based on the invasiveness for the mother and fetus, fetal therapies could be divided into four categories, including non-invasive (medicine administration), minimally invasive (blood transfusion, shunt placement, balloon valvuloplasty, radiofrequency ablation, laser coagulation and fetoscopy surgery), invasive (open surgery) and experimental therapies (stem cell and gene therapy).

Further, continuing improvements in diagnosis and genetic testing bring new insights to professionals and involved families.

> **Roland Axt-Fliedner** *Editor*
