Pathological gambling associated with dopamine agonist therapy in Parkinson's disease.
Muhammad Ali Parkinson Research Center, Barrow Neurological Institute, Phoenix, AZ
From Bloomberg:
(Pathological gambling is a real problem, but the image of formerly slow-moving Parkinson's patients suddenly blowing all their money in Vegas made this paper worth including.)May 9 (Bloomberg) -- Pfizer Inc. and Boehringer Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals Inc. were accused of distributing a drug for treating Parkinson's disease that turned some people into gambling addicts, in a lawsuit filed in Ontario Superior Court...
Researchers at the Muhammad Ali Parkinson's Research Center in Phoenix examined data of almost 2,000 Parkinson's patients over the course of a year. Nine of the patients were diagnosed as pathological gamblers, and seven of them had started gambling within a month of an increase in the dosage of Mirapex or another Parkinson's drug they were taking.
Two patients lost more than $60,000, and none of them had a problem before taking the drugs, according to the study. Gerard Schick, a resident of Midland, Ontario, a city north of Toronto and near a government-approved Indian casino, lost about C$100,000 ($80,757) playing slot machines while taking Mirapex, Merkur said. Other Mirapex users who have come forward claimed to have lost as much as C$750,000 ($605,677), he said...
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