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Dopamine-activating drugs might make people more likely to become sex addicts or gamblers
A recent study revealed some striking findings on the medication prescribed to treat Parkinson’s disease. It turns out these drugs might trigger some compulsive behaviors in the patients, making them more likely to turn into gamblers or sex addicts. This might be a result of the chemicals in the drugs, which activate the dopamine receptors.
Parkinson’s drugs might turn people into sex addicts
If you take drugs to fight Parkinson’s disease, you might keep your brain cells from deteriorating. However, this medication might have some really strange side effects. It turns out people who take dopamine agonists are at a certain risk of becoming sex addicts, gamblers, or of engaging in compulsive shopping or binge eating. These drugs might weaken one’s ability to control one’s impulses.
For the study, researchers selected 411 people from the UK suffering from Parkinson’s. This condition affects the brain cells, so they start degrading over time. When this starts happening, the body can no longer produce dopamine. Since the substance plays an important role in movement, patients are no longer able to control their bodies properly.
These compulsive behaviors can be reversed over a short period of time
Therefore, these patients need to take drugs that can make their brain cells produce more dopamine. Researchers kept the participants under observation for three years, while some of them took the medicine in question. Afterwards, they checked their compulsive behaviors to see how many of them became sex addicts or gamblers.
This way, they noticed a more prominent addictive behavior in those who took the dopamine medicine. Fifty-two percent of those who followed the treatment said they had difficulties in controlling their impulses. In contrast, this applied only to 12 percent of those who didn’t take this type of drugs.
However, these strange side effects can be reversed successfully. A small part of the participants stopped taking the drugs after a certain period of time. Then, they reported feeling a lot better, as their impulses were gone.
Image source: Pixabay
