Tratamento farmacológico da gagueira: evidências e controvérsias

objective: this article analyzes the pharmacologic treatment of stuttering, assessing the effectiveness of different treatments using psychiatric drugs and further evidences of other drugs in the treatment of this disorder. methods: search in medline database, using the terms stuttering treatment, disfluency, disfluency treatments, botulinum toxin and stuttering treatment, botulinum toxin and disfluency treatment. results: studies involving the following drugs were found: citalopram + clomipramine, desipramine, paroxetine, olanzapine, pimozide, risperidone, tiapride, levetiracetam, divalproex sodium, citalopram + alprazolam, clonidine and bethanecol, as well as clinical trials with the botulinum toxin a and anesthetics. studies with citalopram + clomipramine, paroxetine, olanzapine, citalopram + alprazolam, risperidone, clomipramine and desipramine, levetiracetam, divalproex sodium, lidocaine and botulinum toxin a showed positive results. however, the great majority of pharmacological studies in this area are case series or clinical trials with small samples. conclusion: enough evidences do not exist that justify the use of a specific treatment for stuttering. the presented studies indicate the necessity of accomplishment of more double-blind placebo-controlled trials involving larger samples.