Wait, let me get this straight. The medication will cure me of the syndrome and increase the frequency of overeating, gambling away my life, and making sexy time? Where can I sign up for the free trial?

Oh, here's another thing I love - those meds whose side effects include constipation AND diarrhea. Is it possible to have both at the same time? And what would that be like, I wonder? Maybe it's best left to the imagination...

You missed some:

'Furry black tongue'?
There is no way in hell I'm googling that.

Part of my job when reviewing ER charts is to record side effects of normal drugs so they can be tracked. Given the scope of patients, I'd say side effects are actually pretty rare, except for anything that changes the way your brain works (anti-psychotics, antidepressants, anti-seizure meds, etc). In those cases, the chief complaints can get... interesting.

I was actually on Mirapex for a while. It was originally a Parkinson's medication to help control twitching/jerking, but will also work on some of us with RLS. My problem is that when I'm about to fall asleep, or about to switch sleep cycles (especially when I'm going into REM), I jerk pretty violently which either wakes me up completely, or keeps me from hitting REM. I've left bruises on Crystal, without even waking up. So, I saw a neuro specialist who put me on it.

I didn't take it long enough to see any noticeable difference in my behavior though... because it pretty much made me violently ill. I stopped it, deciding some sleep was better than none. Thankfully it's calmed down a bit... I still twitch when laying down, and I have the occasional muscle spasm in my neck or back during the day, but it's not too bad.

Anti-depressants are easily the drugs with the highest side effects that I see, since putting someone on one is really a crap-shoot anyway. In my own medical history, when I first started getting seen for depression, I was put on Trazadone. I've heard stories of this being a wonder drug, but all I remember was sleeping even more, and trying to drink myself to death a few times (which is completely bizarre, since I can't stand the taste or smell of alcohol, so I really don't drink at all... I just didn't care at the time though). Then came Lexapro, which amplified my mood swings... the ups were WAY UP, and the downs were... disinterested wallowing. Wellbutrin worked well, but I stopped it after a while. I haven't had any problems in years.

Been there. Done that. Add gas for the hat trick.

And done without the benefit of meds, all in the "right" combination of foods.

Wow... that's an easy $100 to make.

The Mayo clinic has found 25 cases of people on Mirapex who became compulsive gamblers on Pramipexole (Mirapex is the brand name). They also found that these people pretty much went back to normal at lower dosages. 11 of these patients were in the 2005 Mayo Clinic report. I've found several references to 14 more being acknowledged since then.

The problem with making that bet, is that this drug has been on the market for a good number of years now, in one incarnation or another. It's been used to treat Parkinson's, cluster headaches, libido issues for people on SSRI's, and a few other things. If this drug were still in clinical trials, it would be hard to prove a significant number of people have had weird side affects, but this one's been treating a large number of people for a while now.

So... when do I get my money?

Edit: In the drug's defense, it's a dopamine agonist, and all of those drugs have a chance to cause compulsive behavior in people. If you gamble here and there, you'll probably get a lot worse on this drug. If you don't gamble at all, you'll become compulsive at doing something else. It won't make you a compulsive gambler if you don't gamble already.

I just got done doing a medical study for narcolepsy in which I was given some trial medication from Johnson & Johnson - no idea what it was. I suppose it worked in that I found it impossible to sleep during my daytime sleep tests, but that first night, every hour I would wake up with a feeling of panic, nausea and cold sweats. It just felt like there were people in the room with me. At one point (around 5am) I was sure I could see two ghosts of people in the room. The bitch of it was, because my head was hooked up to a bunch of wires and such I couldn't move more than a foot or two in any direction, so I basically just had to lie there and try not to embarrass myself by freaking out for the sleep tech to see on the night camera.

The inability to stay asleep and the sick feeling upon waking lasted about a week, which sucked, but the hallucinations or whatever that was, thankfully only came around for one more night after that (and then I was home and could get up and walk around). Whatever that med was, though, I definitely want nothing to do with it.
---Todd

Gotta luv marketing - "Treatment Effects" ...

Alli Weightloss

Fun Times for all!

My brother died taking your drug!!! Oh don't worry, it's just a side effect, he'll pop right back up after he stops taking it.

Since you're all so into it, more info on black furry tongues. Metronidazole is an antibiotic and isn't meant to be taken for more than 14 days. Hell, I was only suppose to take it for 7 days and stopped at day 5 because I wanted to taste food again.

You know what the best thing about antibiotics is? It kills EVERYTHING. The infection and all of your freakin good bacteria. You know what is listed as a possible side effect for antibiotics? [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candida_(genus)]Fungal Infection[/url]. Why? Because all the bacteria you had an allegiance with are DEAD. Candida invaded their lands and were victorious because Amoxicillin can't distinguish between friend or foe. @#$%!

Damn Candidians. I'll never trust those maple leaf-loving fungal bastards.

Well, to be fair to your Dad, I was watching his house and I was reading his mail. I just didn't think he'd see me there in the bushes.

Sorry about the mixup.

Levitra claims that one of it's side effects is a rare risk of an erection lasting longer than four hours.

Umm, and how exactly is that a bad thing? Seems to me that if you need to take that type of medication, this will simply give you the opportunity to make up for lost time.

Sounds remarkably similar to a stomach flu or mild food poisoning. Ahh, good times, good times.

The condition is called priapism. From what I've read from my charts (I see this occasionally, not always with medication side-effects), it apparently feels like your rock hard junk is in a 4-way vice being tightened by a professional wrestler.

In short... DO NOT WANT.

I had a drug reaction that was similar once. The main problem being that I was able to get it up... but the plumbing wouldn't let anything flow during sex no matter how much you wanted it to! Odd part was that about an hour or maybe two after sex I got these odd super-Os that happened wither I wanted them too or not. It was weird as there was no warning at all just hello its time for a big O! I went off that drug because of that and the high blood pressure it also caused. I learned that you do NOT want to go off some drugs as the doctor described it as "rapidly due to rick of heart attack". I got massice head aches that meant I couldn't sleep for about a week and I just wanted to sit there and cry through them. They lasted about a week and I'd classify that week as the worst in my life nearly.