What is dopamine syndrome?!


Question:

What is dopamine syndrome?

I have been prescribed very high doses of a dopamine reuptake inhibitor by a psychiatrist who wanted me to experience "more pleasure". Instead, I have been been talking to people who aren't there, have gotten astigmatism, tremors, and seizure-like jerks. After 9 months of this, he says "Oh no! You have dopamine syndrome!"


Answers:

L-dopamine is a neurotransmitter in the brain and nervous system. Too little of it results in Parkinsonism and Parkinson like tremors. Too much of it is hypothesized to cause the HALLUCINATIONS THAT ARE EXPERIENCED IN SCHIZOPHRENIA AND OTHER PSYCHOSES. Dopamine is also a neurohormone acting on the pituitary to regulate prolactin levels.

A dopamine re-uptake inhibitor would result in their being too much dopamine in the neural clefts and maybe psychotic like symptoms which you described. This I presume is what the Dr. meant by dopamine syndrome.

For more information type "schizophrenia/dopamine" into Yahoo! search and a number of informative links comes up. Wikipedia has a good summary. Also try, "Parkinson's disease/dopamine" and "prolactin/dopamine" Just typing in "dopamine" gives you a number of links describing this molecule including wikipedia which is a good account.

Dopamine is also increased by taking cocaine and heroin which results in the hallucination like experiences.

I hope this helps, good luck, good health, peace and love!




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