Hypersexuality induced by rasagiline in monotherapy in Parkinson's disease.

Abstract

Impulse control disorders (ICDs), such as hyper sexuality (HS), are well-known in patients with Parkinson’s disease (PD), especially those treated with dopamine agonists. Although it is unusual, some cases have been published about the association between monoamine oxidase inhibitor type B (MAO-B) and ICD. Here, we report the second case of hyper sexuality in a patient with PD treated de novo with rasagiline alone. Although we found other similar cases regarding selegiline or rasagiline but always in association with other drugs, like dopamine agonists. *Corresponding author: Cristina Simonet, Division of Neurology, Complejo Asistencial de Segovia, Segovia, Spain, Tel: +34 699780445; E-mail: cris.simonet@gmail.com Received February 10, 2016; Accepted March 07, 2016; Published March 14, 2016 Citation: Simonet C, Fernandez B, Cerdan DM, Duarte J (2016) Hypersexuality Induced by Rasagiline in Monotherapy in Parkinson’s Disease. J Alzheimers Dis Parkinsonism 6: 221. doi: 10.4172/2161-0460.1000221 Copyright: © 2016 Simonet C, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Dopamine is recognized as a mediator of reinforcement in the mesolimbic area and it is implicated in drug addiction and is also recognized to play an important role in the regulation of sexuality [7]. However, hypersexual behavior has also been described as part of a general loss of impulse control associated with lesions in the prefrontal cortex. A possible explication why MAO-B can induce ICD would be the increasing stimulation of postsynaptic dopamine receptors present in the amygdala and limbic lobe or activation of still dysfunctional cortico-basal circuits linking the orbito-frontal and anterior cingulate cortex via head of caudate. Sexual behaviour usually appears shortly after the initiation of treatment [5,8]. In our case, the diagnosis occurred 2 years later. One possible explanation would be that our patient didn t reveal his symptoms immediately because of his religion ideology. Another point that seems to indicate an association between HS and rasagiline is the improvement of symptoms after drug interruption. We are presenting an isolated case of hypersexuality induced by rasagiline. Some more studies should be needed to establish a solid relationship between both and at the same time to describe the most common risk factors.