ABSTRACT

The placenta may harbor many diagnostic tools available for the care of ill neonates. Such tools enable fine-tuning of diagnoses or even the establishment of diagnoses not considered during the investigation and care of the newborn. For this reason, obstetricians, pediatricians, and pathologists should all be familiar with common placental diagnoses so that sharing of the available data among these specialists may, in many cases, provide supportive and diagnostic information critical to the management of the newborn.