Dr Robin Lickley of Queen Margaret University, Edinburgh reports on the first European Symposium on Fluency Disorders, last April.

Friday 18 and Saturday 19 April 2008 saw the first European Symposium on Fluency Disorders, in Antwerp - 'Stuttering. The nature... the treatment'. The hosts welcomed 300 participants from 25 different countries.

The opening sessions on both days were 2-hour presentations by 'big names' from the USA, Nan Bernstein Ratner (University of Maryland at College Park) on Friday and Edward G. Conture (Vanderbilt University, Nashville) on Saturday, presenting research findings on 'The Psycholinguistics of Stuttering' and 'Diathesis-Stressor Model of Childhood Stuttering', respectively. While differing on the main focus of their approaches, both presenters agreed on one thing at least: Studies of the causes of stuttering should focus on children as close as possible to onset.

Luc de Nil (University of Toronto) followed Bernstein Ratner's presentation with a good overview of studies of the brain and stuttering, while Conture was followed by Kurt Egger's (University of Leuven) talk on temperament and attentional factors. Both afternoons, the congress hall hosted more American academics, this time via video link - Nicoline G. Ambrose on genetics of stuttering, and J. Scott Yaruss with an amusing presentation on treatment outcomes and the need for comprehensive assessment. Between plenary sessions in the congress hall, the conference divided into two, with an eclectic range of presentations on research, treatment and outcomes.

Apart from the big names from across the pond, who was there? BSA members will know Tom Weidig, former Trustee and founder chair of the BSA research committee, whose 'Thestutteringbrain' blog is always worth a read: Tom presented a laudably minimalist poster on why so much of what is believed about the onset of stuttering may be flawed. It was a very popular poster, not least because Tom was giving away Belgian chocolates to anyone who tried hard enough to share the cynicism. By happy coincidence, the very same poster board was occupied on the second day by a poster by current BSA Research Committee member, Dave Rowley (co-authored by Suzana Jelčić Jakšić and Mirjana Lasan - organisers of last year's world conference in Croatia), whose poster suggested that there may be a link between hospitalisation in childhood and the onset of stuttering.

Those who attended the BSA Conference in Telford in 2007 will remember ELSA vice-chair Anita Blom, whose presentation 'P-piece of the P-puzzle' brought the first day's proceedings to a close and signalled an orderly procession to the beer pumps of the city.

Shelagh Brumfitt from the University of Sheffield and Isabel O'Leary from the SLT service, Sheffield and Nottingham presented the only other two posters with UK authors, with work on 'Stammering and the use of the mobile phone' (Adams and Brumfitt) and 'An evaluation of routine clinical practice: Group therapy for adults who stutter' (O'Leary, Williams, Marriot and Brumfitt). Frances Cook and Willie Botterill from the Michael Palin Centre were also in attendance.

I get the feeling that the UK could have been better represented in a delegate count of 300 (though there was a large number of locals).

Pan-European course

So, why the new Symposium? The event was organised as part of the activities of partners in a new initiative to provide a pan-European course in Fluency Disorders, the European Clinical Specialization in Fluency Disorders (ECSF). Supported with EU Socrates funding, this one-year course promises to turn Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs) into European Fluency Specialists, via two intensive study weeks, specialist clinical guidance and reading and assignments. The first intensive week of the programme took place in the week immediately following the Symposium, at Lessius University College, with 24 students. The second week takes place at University College, Dublin, in September. So far, no UK universities are involved in the programme, and my spies tell me that there are no UK-based SLTs registered for the programme yet.

So, essentially, this was a Symposium targeted at SLTs, rather than at people who stutter: But hopefully we will see the benefit for SLTs and for people who stutter, if the programme develops and expands over the next few years. There can never be enough specialist training.

Pdfs of presentations at the Symposium: www.ecsf.eu/nl/news-and-events/european-symposium-on-fluency-disorders-2008/program
Information about the European Clinical Specialization in Fluency Disorders: www.ecsf.eu

From the Summer 2008 issue of 'Speaking Out', page 18