Real-time Assessment of the Development and Function of the Placenta Across Gestation to Support Therapeutics in Pregnancy

Leveraging the placenta to advance neonatal care

The impact of placental dysfunction and placental injury on the fetus and newborn infant has become a topic of growing interest in neonatal disease research. However, the use of placental pathology in directing or influencing neonatal clinical management continues to be limited for a wide range of reasons, some of which are historical and thus easily overcome today. In this review, we summarize the most recent literature linking placental function to neonatal outcomes, focusing on clinical placental pathology findings and the most common neonatal diagnoses that have been associated with placental dysfunction. We discuss how recent technological advances in neonatal and perinatal medicine may allow us to make a paradigm shift, in which valuable information provided by the placenta could be used to guide neonatal management more effectively, and to ultimately enhance neonatal care in order to improve our patient outcomes. We propose new avenues of clinical management in which the placenta could serve as a diagnostic tool toward more personalized neonatal intensive care unit management.

Killing two birds with one stone: Pregnancy is a sensitive window for endocrine effects on both the mother and the fetus

Pregnancy is a complex process requiring tremendous physiological changes in the mother in order to fulfill the needs of the growing fetus, and to give birth, expel the placenta and nurse the newborn. These physiological modifications are accompanied with psychological changes, as well as with variations in habits and behaviors. As a result, this period of life is considered as a sensitive window as impaired functional and physiological changes in the mother can have short- and long-term impacts on her health. In addition, dysregulation of the placenta and of mechanisms governing placentation have been linked to chronic diseases later-on in life for the fetus, in a concept known as the Developmental Origin of Health and Diseases (DOHaD). This concept stipulates that any change in the environment during the pre-conception and perinatal (in utero life and neonatal) period to puberty, can be "imprinted" in the organism, thereby impacting the health and risk of chronic diseases later in life. Pregnancy is a succession of events that is regulated, in large part, by hormones and growth factors. Therefore, small changes in hormonal balance can have important effects on both the mother and the developing fetus. An increasing number of studies demonstrate that exposure to endocrine disrupting compounds (EDCs) affect both the mother and the fetus giving rise to growing concerns surrounding these exposures. This review will give an overview of changes that happen during pregnancy with respect to the mother, the placenta, and the fetus, and of the current literature regarding the effects of EDCs during this specific sensitive window of exposure.