| Bhat et al. (2004)(35)
| 90 (in vitro) | 15–37 | There was a positive correlation between ventricular mass and gestational age. |
| Rizzo et al. (2007)(33)
| 56 (16 with intrauterine growth restrictions and 40 controls) | 20–34 | There was good agreement between the measurements of the ventricular cardiac volumes using 4D-STIC with VOCAL and 2D- ultrasound with Doppler. |
| Messing B et al. (2007)(36)
| 100 | 20–40 | It was demonstrated that 4D-STIC was simple, highly reproducible, and could be used for assessing fetal cardiac function. Nomograms for ventricular volume, stroke volume, and ejection fraction were established by gestational age. The ratio between RV and LV volumes was 1.4. The stroke volume ranged from 0.78 to 5.50 cm3, and the ejection fraction ranged from 42.5% to 86.0%. |
| Molina et al. (2008)(14)
| 140 | 12–34 | There was a positive correlation of stroke volume and CO of both ventricles with gestational age. |
| Hamill et al. (2009)(37)
| 44 | 19–40 | VOCAL had good reproducibility for measuring cardiac volumes. |
| Uittenbogaard et al. (2010)(38)
| 76 (in vitro) |
| 4D-STIC was shown to be a viable and accurate method for calculating volumes from 0.30 mL. In vitro, 4D-STIC combined with the 3D slice method was more accurate, less time-consuming, and more reliable than VOCAL. |
| Rizzo et al. (2010)(34)
| 45 (15 with congenital heart disease and 30 healthy controls) | 19–32 | The authors compared ventricular volumes obtained by 4D-STIC with VOCAL and with sonography-based automated volume count (SonoAVC). The time necessary to measure volumes using SonoAVC was significantly shorter than that of the two other methods. However, SonoAVC and VOCAL results were similar. One limitation of the study was the small sample size. |
| Simioni et al. (2011)(39)
| 265 | 20–34 | Reference curves were constructed for stroke volume, CO, and ejection faction according to GA. Stroke volume and CO were positively correlated with GA. |
| Hamill et al. (2011)(28)
| 184 | 19–42 | RV diastolic and systolic volumes were larger than LV volumes. LV ejection fraction was larger than RV ejection fraction. Stroke volume and CO increased with GA, without significant differences between the LV and RV. |
| Schoonderwald et al. (2012)(40)
| 30 (84 acquired volumes – 54 excluded volumes) | 20–34 | Cardiac volume, stroke volume, and ejection fraction were compared using Simpson’s and VOCAL methods, and both methods were highly reproducible. The small sample size was considered a limitation to use 4D-STIC in clinical practice. *Strict criteria were adopted to include high-quality images of cardiac volumes. |
| Simioni et al. (2012)(41)
| 216 (108 fetuses of each sex) | 20–24 | There were no significant sex differences in CO and ejection fraction. |
| DeKoninck et al. (2012)(42)
| 15 | 16, 24, and 24 | There was good reproducibility of 3D ultrasonography with 4D-STIC for measuring CO when compared to 2D- Doppler ultrasonography. 4D-STIC combined with SonoAVC and the inversion mode showed higher intra- and interobserver reproducibility than 4D-STIC combined with VOCAL. |
| Hamill et al. (2013)(43)
| 34 | 20–36 | There was an inverse correlation between ventricular CO and vascular resistance of the umbilical artery using 4D-STIC and VOCAL. |
| Rolo et al. (2015)(44)
| 200 | 18–33 | 4D-STIC with VOCAL was highly reproducible and was used to calculate the volumes of the IVS by GA. |
| Barros et al. (2015)(45)
| 371 | 20–33 | 4D-STIC and VOCAL was highly reproducible and was used to construct reference curves for the volumes of the ventricular walls of the fetal heart by GA. |
| Araujo Júnior et al. (2016)(46)
| 170 | 20–33 | 4D-STIC and VOCAL was used to construct reference curves for atrial wall volumes of the fetal heart. |
