Dr. Aiswarya Liz Varghese

Many of us would have seen a person with a stutter in our day to day lives,or in movies or would have read about it. It is increasingly becoming a common problem with many people these days.A person who has stuttering goes through lot of anxiety,fear,tension,inferiority complex etc. are some of the feelings and they tend to withdraw from talking to others. It usually begins in childhood and continues to be in adulthood for many of the people who are affected. The cause of stuttering is still unknown but there are various factors which are reported to be leading to the issue. Genetics play a major role and it is usually observed that it runs in families, So if there is somebody in the family who is having stuttering, the chances are high for another person in the family to have the same difficulty. Language learning years is especially taxing for a child and that can also lead to fluency issues. For children it is easier to get rid of stuttering as compared to adults with the careful guidance of professionals. As an adult it can affect the day to day activities of a person like getting into the right job, selection of the life partner etc. But there is a ray of hope for all of them because stuttering can be treated!!!!! Speech therapy is an effective tool for helping people with stuttering. It not only helps reduce the difficulties that a person experience while talking but also takes care of the specific issues that a person may have while talking to higher authorities, opposite gender or to strangers. Getting a Speech therapy consultation at the right time matters a lot and intervention should be started as early as possible. Worldwide, October 22nd is celebrated as International Stuttering awareness day and this day is intended to raise public awareness about stuttering. Many programs are conducted all over the world to create and spread an understanding about stuttering and also ways to treat it. The Department of Audiology and Speech Language Pathology offers services towards the assessment and intervention of individuals with stuttering.Those who are interested to seek help with the problem of stuttering may kindly contact the department.