Posted by Mistermindmasta on January 19, 2005, at 11:39:01
In reply to drug induced psychosis in PD, posted by dondon on January 18, 2005, at 18:36:03
> Do they use antipsychotics for levodopa induced psychosis in parkinson's disease? My grandmother has PD and takes levodopa and she recently had a psychotic episode. Can you take antipsychotics while taking antiparkinson drugs? Wouldn't the antipsychotic antagonize the effects of the anti-parkinson's drugs? Abilify seems like the best med to use for parkinson's disease becaues it has dopamine agonist activity and antagonist activity at the same time.
What I just want to point out is that the worst side effects of antipsychotics, the EPS effects, are basically mimicking parkinson's disease, from a biochemical standpoint. Would you really want to add parkinson's disease symptoms on top of actual parkinson's disease?
Levodopa increases dopamine nonspecifically in the brain, and for parkison's, you want specificity. You want more dopamine in the nigrostriatal dopamine tract. A side effect is the increases in dopamine in other brain areas, which causes the psychosis. By taking an antipsychotic, yes, you would be able to lower dopamine in these other brain areas, but there's also the chance you'd be lowering it in that nigtrostriatal chance. Abilify SEEMS like a good choice for a drug that would minimize EPS events, but I've heard a good amount of posts here of abilify giving akasthisia, which is definitely a lowering of dopamine in the nigrostriatal tract.
Whatever you do, be careful with these antipsychotics and good luck. Hopefully you find something that works.
poster:Mistermindmasta
thread:443872
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20050119/msgs/444204.html