A recent study has found that medication routinely prescribed to treat Parkinson’s disease could have side effects that lead to impulse control disorders, including compulsive gambling, shopping and sexual activities.

Thomas Moore, lead author on the study, called the findings, “a striking example of a major problem in drug safety.” He went on to state that this was an example of medication promoting major behavior altering side effects that compel people to act destructively.

The drugs in question for this study belong to a class known as dopamine receptor agonists. These drugs work by replicating dopamine activity within the brain and are used to treat an array of diseases, including restless leg syndrome and Parkinson’s.

This type of medication is so widely used that more than 2 million prescriptions were filled in the last quarter of 2012.

The study reviewed a decade of data gathered by the FDA on over 2.7 million reported cases of adverse effects from medication. Analysis revealed 1,580 instances of behavior classified as “serious” impulse control problems. Over half of these instances were reported in American patients.

710, or 45 percent, of all reported events were linked back to six drugs from the dopamine receptor agonist class. Of these, 65 percent were male patients whose ages averaged around 55 years.

The majority of the cases, over 60 percent, were reported in people being treated for Parkinson’s disease. Just under 25 percent were being treated for restless leg syndrome.

All told, researchers identified 202 instances of compulsive shopping, 465 reports of hypersexuality and 628 cases of compulsive gambling. They believe these numbers to be representative of only a modest estimate of the real problem.

Moore asserts that the risk of impulse control issues is not a rare one with this type of medication. He says that his cautious assessment is that these issues appear in about 10 percent of all patients taking the drugs. He suspects that the number of people reporting issues is smaller than the number experiencing them, specifically because of the shame attached to many of the behaviors.

Even if the number of negative behavioral side effects is larger than the study found, there are only a few viable options to treat Parkinson’s. Moore suggests that more research is needed and patients need to be educated in ways that would encourage them to more accurately report behavioral changes.