Published papers

Radical trachelectomy (RT) is a surgery for early-stage cervical cancer treatment that preserves the childbearing ability, and its use has become increasingly common worldwide. Thus, the rate of conception in women who have undergone RT is increasing. However, pregnancy after RT is associated with a higher risk of several obstetric complications such as preterm delivery, preterm premature membrane rupture, and abnormal bleeding from varices at the site of uterovaginal anastomosis. Furthermore, since RT have a residual prophylactic cerclage, it is difficult to manage first- and second-trimester miscarriages. There is little previous data on the management of pregnancy after RT. In this review article, we summarize various management methods and experiences to provide a guide to clinicians for perinatal management after RT.

Cardiotocography records fetal heart rates and their temporal relationship to uterine contractions. To identify high risk fetuses, obstetricians inspect cardiotocograms (CTGs) by eye. Therefore, CTG traces are often interpreted differently among obstetricians, resulting in inappropriate interventions. However, few studies have focused on quantitative and nonbiased algorithms for CTG evaluation. In this study, we propose a newly constructed deep neural network model (CTG-net) to detect compromised fetal status. CTG-net consists of three convolutional layers that extract temporal patterns and interrelationships between fetal heart rate and uterine contraction signals. We aimed to classify the abnormal group (umbilical artery pH < 7.20 or Apgar score at 1 min < 7) and the normal group from CTG data. We evaluated the performance of the CTG-net with the F1 score and compared it with conventional algorithms, namely, support vector machine and k-means clustering, and another deep neural network model, long short-term memory. CTG-net showed the area under the receiver operating characteristic curve of 0.73 ± 0.04, which was significantly higher than that of long short-term memory. CTG-net, a quantitative and automated diagnostic aid system, enables early intervention for putatively abnormal fetuses, resulting in a reduction in the number of cases of hypoxic injury.

© 2019, © 2019 The European Society of Contraception and Reproductive Health. Objective: We investigated the effectiveness of removing lost intrauterine devices (IUDs) that had been in place for over 10 years, using Lin's biopsy grasper in an office setting. Methods:This single-centre, retrospective study conducted between March 2006 and June 2018 included 49 women who had had an IUD in place for contraception for more than 10 years and who underwent removal of the lost IUD using Lin's biopsy grasper under transabdominal sonography without use of a tenaculum, anaesthesia and analgesia, after dilation of the cervical os and hysteroscopy. Results: The women's median age was 52 years (range 34–80 years) and the median duration of insertion was 17 years (range 10–43 years). Forty-eight (98%) women had their lost IUD removed using Lin's biopsy grasper. Among the removed IUDs, there were eight FD-1 IUDs with a string, 13 FD-1 IUDs without a string, 13 Chinese IUDs, seven Ota ring IUDs, three KS ring IUDs, two Saf-T-Coil IUDs, two Lippe loop IUDs and one Wing IUD. All women tolerated the procedure and there were no major operative complications. Conclusions: Lin's biopsy grasper was effective in removing IUDs that had been in place for a long time.

© 2020 Gynecology and Minimally Invasive Therapy. Objectives: There are no data describing the correlation between placenta implantation at prior myomectomy locations and perinatal outcomes in pregnant women after transcervical resection myomectomy (TCR-M). The aim of the study is to investigate the correlations between placenta implantation at prior myomectomy locations and perinatal outcomes in pregnant women who had previously undergone TCR-M. Materials and Methods: This was a retrospective, single-center study. We reviewed the records of 34 pregnant women who had previously undergone TCR-M for submucosal myoma and perinatal care in our hospital between January 2012 and January 2019. We examined surgical and pregnancy outcomes and evaluated correlations between placenta implantation at prior myomectomy locations and perinatal outcomes in women who delivered after 22 gestational weeks (n = 24). Results: Median maternal age at conception was 38 years (range, 28-44) and median duration between TCR-M and conception was 1.4 years (range, 0.3-5.8). There were 24 deliveries after 22 gestational weeks and 10 pregnancy losses. Among these 24 deliveries, the median gestational age at delivery was 39 weeks (range, 34-41); median birthweight, 3025 g (range, 2092-4012); and median blood loss at delivery, 573 g (range, 100-3000). There were no cases of placenta accreta and uterine rupture. Placenta implantation at a prior myomectomy location was detected in 14/24 women using transabdominal ultrasonography. Median blood loss was significantly higher in the implantation than in the nonimplantation group (P < 0.01). Conclusion: Our one-step TCR-M is useful for women with submucosal myoma. However, we suggest that clinicians should review and check the association between prior myomectomy locations and placenta implantation.

Even in the context of modern medicine, infants with fetal and neonatal neurological diseases such as cerebral palsy and myelomeningocele suffer serious long-lasting impairment due to the irreversible neuronal damage. The promotion of neurologically intact survival in patients with perinatal intractable neurological diseases requires the development of novel strategies. One promising strategy involves the use of human amniotic fluid stem cells (hAFSCs), which have attracted much attention in recent years and are known to exert anti-inflammatory and neuroprotective effects. In recent years, the therapeutic effects of hAFSCs on fetal-neonatal neurological diseases have become evident as per intense research efforts by our group and others. Specifically, hAFSCs administered into the nasal cavity migrated to the brain and controlled local inflammation in a rodent model of neonatal hypoxic-ischemic encephalopathy. In contrast, hAFSCs administered intraperitoneally did not migrate to the brain; they rather formed spheroids in the abdominal cavity, resulting in the suppression of systemic inflammation (including in the brain) via the secretion of anti-inflammatory cytokines in concert with peritoneal macrophages in a rodent model of periventricular leukomalacia. Moreover, studies in a rat model of myelomeningocele suggested that hAFSCs administered in utero secreted hepatocyte growth factor and protected the exposed spinal cord during pregnancy. Importantly, autologous hAFSCs, whose use for fetal-neonatal treatment does not raise ethical issues, can be collected during pregnancy and prepared in sufficient numbers for therapeutic use. This article outlines the results of preclinical research on fetal stem cell therapy, mainly involving hAFSCs, in the context of perinatal neurological diseases.

The use of mesenchymal stem cell sheets is a promising strategy for skin regeneration. The injection of dissociated human amniotic fluid stem cells (hAFSCs) was recently found to accelerate cutaneous wound healing with reduced fibrotic scarring, similar to fetal wound healing. However, the use of hAFSCs in applications of cell sheet technology remains limited. The aim of this study was to determine the in vivo efficacy of in vitro-cultured hAFSC sheets in wound healing. The cell sheets were characterized by immunohistochemistry and RT-qPCR and grafted onto full-thickness wounds in BALB/c mice. The wound size was measured, and re-epithelialization, granulation tissue area, and collagen content of the regenerated wound were analyzed histologically. Although the hAFSC sheet contained abundant extracellular matrix molecules and expressed high levels of anti-fibrotic mediators, its grafting did not affect wound closure or the size of the granulation tissue area. In contrast, the organization of type I collagen bundles in the regenerated wound was markedly reduced, while the levels of type III collagen were increased after implantation of the hAFSC sheet. These results suggest that hAFSC sheets can exert anti-fibrotic properties without delaying wound closure.

今回我々は、妊娠初期の人工妊娠中絶術後に大量性器出血をきたした胎盤ポリープの1例を経験したので報告する。症例は37歳、4経妊2経産。前医における妊娠7週時の人工妊娠中絶術ののち、術後43日日に大量性器出血を生じ当院に救急搬送となった。経腟超音波検査およびDynamic CTにて動脈性血流を伴う子宮内腫瘤を認め、胎盤ポリープ疑いと診断した。子宮動脈塞栓術後も小量の性器出血が持続し、MRIでは腫瘤への血流残存を認めた。患者本人が妊孕性温存を希望しなかったため、腹腔鏡下腟式子宮全摘出術を施行した。摘出子宮には内腔に突出する有茎性腫瘤(長径7cm)を認め、病理組織検査にて胎盤ポリープと確定診断された。胎盤ポリープは妊娠初期の流産後でも発症しうる疾患であり、妊娠終了後の大量性器出血時の鑑別診断において常に念頭におく必要がある。(著者抄録)

前置血管は胎児血管が卵膜上を走行し、内子宮口付近に存在する病態である。未診断例では児の予後は不良であるが、早期診断することで良好な予後が期待できる。今回我々は当院で経験した前置血管症例の周産期臨床像について、文献的考察を含めて後方視的に検討した。対象は2009年1月以降に当院で周産期管理を行った前置血管6例である。全例単胎(自然妊娠5例、体外受精/胚移植1例)で、診断週数は妊娠27週(中央値)であった。分娩週数は妊娠35週(中央値)で全例帝王切開術を行い、母児ともに予後良好であった。術中に超音波検査を用いて胎児血管の走行を確認し、胎児血管の破綻を回避した。6例中4例に低置胎盤を認め、全例が臍帯卵膜付着であった。既報のごとく、前置血管症例には付属物異常の合併が高率であったことから、胎盤位置異常や臍帯付着部異常症例に関しては前置血管の発症を念頭に置いた超音波検査や管理が重要であると考えられた。(著者抄録)