Abstract
The collective changes that occur in the fetal organs and tissues after fetal death in utero are referred to as maceration changes; they differ from pure postmortem autolysis because they occur in utero, in fluid, and at body temperature. The changes of maceration are therefore commonly encountered by the pathologist performing fetal autopsies and examining fetal tissues at the surgical pathology bench. This chapter reviews how the histologic fetal and placental changes of maceration can be used to predict the timing of fetal death in utero, discuss histologic artifacts introduced by maceration, and describe the challenges of assessing pathologic changes in a background of maceration.
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Ernst, L.M., Fritsch, M.K. (2019). Histological Changes Associated with Fetal Maceration. In: Ernst, L., Ruchelli, E., Carreon, C., Huff, D. (eds) Color Atlas of Human Fetal and Neonatal Histology. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11425-1_37
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-11425-1_37
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