“Parkinson’s drug made me addicted to gambling”

A 70-year-old Italian retired man is taking his doctors and two pharmaceutical companies to court, he claims that the medication he received to control his Parkinson’s disease, made him addicted to casino gambling and he is asking £250,000 compensation to repay his gambling debts.

Paolo Chisci, a retired shop owner from Carrara, claims that doctors failed to warn about the possible side effects of the medication he received to control his Parkinson’s disease. The man says he never gambled, but not long after starting the drug, he began playing slot machines and scratch cards, he bought a lot at once, sometimes 500 scratch cards a day. Next month, the man will appear in a court in Italy against the pharmaceutical companies Boeringher and Ely Lilly and his local health authority because they did not warn him about possible side effects. He is claiming £ 250,000 in damages he lost in the last ten years with gambling because of the Parkinson’s drug dopamine agonists. His lawyers said he took the drug between 1999 and 2005, but the known side-effects including compulsive gambling were not added until 6 years ago. Other side effects include orgasmic intensity, weight loss and nausea, but also addictions to shopping, Internet pornography and hyper-sexuality.

His lawyer, Riccardo Lenzetti said: “In essence what we are arguing is that there was no warning of the side effects, which we say were known of, when he was prescribed the drugs to control his Parkinson’s disease. As a result of these side effects our client became a compulsive gambler and spent his life savings on lottery scratch cards and slot machines. He barely has a cent to his name now.” The man was examined by psychiatrists who found that the man was a regular saver before taking the drug, this point will be held in court. Chisci has now stopped the medication and is on other tablets. Parkinson’s disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system and dopamine agonists are used to keep the symptoms like trembling, stiffness and slowness of movement under control. In 2008 a retired police man from the U.S. won 5.3 million pounds in damages in a lawsuit in which the man claimed to have become addicted to casino gambling by the Parkinson’s medicine.

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