Stuttering causes shyness in speaking. We are afraid to attend phone calls as we come face to face with the problem. In stuttering, the person repeats the same word several times. Stammering is a fault in speech and it happens suddenly when we are unconscious about our flow of words or when we speak quite fast and when we become excited.
Dr. Gerald Maguire, a psychiatrist at the University of California, Irvine, wants to cure the ailment. This ailment afflicts him and a million others around the world. Even I face the problem of stammering in my speech. Dr. Maguire is searching for a drug, organizing chemical trial and even testing the treatment on himself. Indevus Pharmaceuticals announced in May the encouraging results of the study. The trials will need 2 to 3 years. They stated the drug “pagoclone” is the first medicine to cure stuttering. The research is carried on using DNA studies, brain scans and other techniques. It has been found that Moses was a stutterer. He told the Lord that he was “slow of speech and of a slow tongue.”
Statistics of stuttering: It has been found that 1% of the world population stutter. Men who stutter outnumber women 4 to 1. We still do not know the reason why women stutter less than men.
Brain imaging studies: The studies show that the brain of people who stammer behave differently than those who do not stammer when it comes to processing of speech. According to Luc De Nil, chairman of the department of speech and language pathology at the University of Toronto states that people who do not stammer, the speech processing is done in the left hemisphere. The stutterers show an unusually large amount of activity in the right hemisphere. There is an excess of dopamine in brain of those who stutter.
Pagoclone was tested for panic disorder and anxiety. As the results were mixed, Pfizer which previously had the rights to the drug gave it to Indevus. In those trials, some people reported that they really got the benefit.
Clinical trial of the drug: In the clinical trial, 88 patients got the drug and 44 a placebo.
1. The participants were videotaped in conversation and reading.
2. Both before starting on the drug or a placebo and four and eight weeks after.
3. Evaluation counted the proportion of syllables stuttered.
4. In a separate measure, the clinicians evaluated the patient’s speech.
Results of the trial: Those who got the drug spoke 55% better than those who got the placebo (it accounted 36%).
Side effects of the drug:
1. Headache.
2. Fatigue.
Encouraging aspects of the study: The most interesting aspect of the study is the drug is that people can speak better than before. They are coming out of their shell. They can get their job they wanted, they can go for a date, and they can easily approach others.