Fetal surveillance.

The primary objective of fetal surveillance is to prevent antenatal fetal deaths, which still account for greater than one half of perinatal mortality. Several techniques for assessing fetal well-being are available to the practicing obstetrician, including fetal movement counting, nonstress testing, contraction stress testing, fetal biophysical assessment with real-time sonography, and Doppler ultrasonography for measuring umbilical and fetal blood flow. Despite several unanswered questions regarding fetal surveillance, identification of high-risk pregnancies allows appropriate fetal evaluation that can reduce intrauterine fetal death rates.