Recapping the 2026 STARS Conference and the Push for Interdisciplinary Stuttering Care: Gerald Maguire, MD

Stuttering, or childhood-onset fluency disorder, typically emerges between ages 2 and 7 years and affects approximately 5% of individuals at some point during development. Although 70% to 80% recover by adolescence, persistent stuttering affects roughly 1% of adults.¹ Evidence increasingly supports a neurobiological basis for the condition. A genome-wide analysis of more than 1 million individuals identified 57 loci and showed genetic similarity between stuttering and autism and depression.²

Researchers have also proposed that stuttering is best understood as a heterogeneous spectrum disorder with diverse causes, which argues for individualized treatment.³ Even so, no medications are FDA approved for stuttering. Dopamine antagonists have been shown to reduce symptom severity, whereas dopamine agonists can worsen symptoms. This matters for clinicians managing common comorbidities such as ADHD.⁴

To address these gaps, Stuttering Treatment and Research Society (STARS) convened a 35-member international panel to develop the first interdisciplinary consensus guidelines on stuttering, published in August 2026. The panel included experts in psychiatry, neurology, and speech-language pathology, as well as people who stutter. In the guidelines, 94% of panelists gave the highest level of agreement that stuttering should be recognized as a brain-based disorder.

More than 90% endorsed interdisciplinary care as the standard for persistent stuttering, and nearly 90% rated the current treatment landscape as fair or poor.¹ The guidelines were the centerpiece of the second annual STARS Research and Education Conference, held in September 2026 in Laguna Niguel, California, which built on the inaugural meeting in 2025. The 3-day meeting offered CME/CEU-accredited training sessions. It also featured the announcement of STARS' first Center of Excellence at Saint Louis University, an interdisciplinary research and treatment center slated to open in early 2027.⁵

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“The one thing that we can do even today is recognize the comorbid neuropsychiatric conditions that exist with stuttering and treat those.”

To discuss highlights from this year's meeting, NeurologyLive^® spoke with Gerald Maguire, MD, president and founder of STARS and chair of psychiatry and director of residency training at College Medical Center in Long Beach, California. Maguire, who is a person who stutters himself, said the 2026 meeting drew a broader mix of physicians than the inaugural conference.

Attendees came from psychiatry, neurology, pediatrics, primary care, and neurosurgery, alongside psychologists and speech-language pathologists. He emphasized the meeting's central message that stuttering is a brain-based disorder that frequently co-occurs with neuropsychiatric conditions such as ADHD and depression.

He also noted growing interest in pairing speech therapy with psychotherapies, such as cognitive behavioral therapy and acceptance and commitment therapy, and with biologic treatments. From there, Maguire walked through the core messages of the consensus guidelines. These include a knowledge gap among physicians, the absence of stuttering from medical school curricula, a lack of biological research, and no validated rating scale or definition of a meaningful clinical response.

REFERENCES
1. Maguire GA, Duerr HA, SheikhBahaei S, et al. Interdisciplinary consensus guidelines on stuttering (childhood-onset fluency disorder): addressing issues in diagnosis, treatment, and unmet needs. Psychiatric Times. 2026;43(8). Accessed November 2, 2026. https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/interdisciplinary-consensus-guidelines-on-stuttering-childhood-onset-fluency-disorder
2. Polikowsky HG, Scartozzi AC, Shaw DM, et al. Large-scale genome-wide analyses of stuttering. Nat Genet. 2025;57(8):1835-1847. doi:10.1038/s41588-025-02267-2
3. SheikhBahaei S, Millwater M, Maguire GA. Stuttering as a spectrum disorder: a hypothesis. Curr Res Neurobiol. 2023;5:100116. doi:10.1016/j.crneur.2023.100116
4. Maguire GA, Nguyen DL, Simonson KC, Kurz TL. The pharmacologic treatment of stuttering and its neuropharmacologic basis. Front Neurosci. 2020;14:158. doi:10.3389/fnins.2020.00158
5. Stuttering Treatment and Research Society (STARS) announces first ever Center of Excellence for Stuttering at St. Louis University at second annual research and education conference. News release. Stuttering Treatment and Research Society. September 29, 2026. Accessed November 2, 2026. https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/stuttering-treatment-and-research-society-stars-announces-first-ever-center-of-excellence-for-stuttering-at-st-louis-university-at-second-annual-research-and-education-conference-302892881.html