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Dorothy Moate is regularly overcome by such insatiable compulsion to eat that she’s been known to start baking a cake at 2am.
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she → publish → am
‘It was carrot cake this morning,’ Dorothy, 74, a retired teaching assistant from Plymouth, told Good Health.
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Dorothy → tell → Health
‘I absolutely have to bake – not a day goes by when I don’t.
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I → have → ?
Then I eat what I’ve baked,’ she says.
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she → eat → what
Even ten minutes after a big meal she starts to feel hungry again and has to eat more.
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she → start → more
Dorothy is also regularly affected by an uncontrollable urge to shop, and her home is festooned with piles of new clothes that she does not need – and more than 50 pairs of shoes.
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she → affect → shoes
Until recently, she had a modest appetite and weighed a trim 8st, and only bought clothes she actually needed.
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she → have → clothes
She says the urges were triggered by drugs prescribed by her doctor – and she is now struggling to wean herself off them.
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she → say → them
The medications in question, called dopamine agonists, are widely used to treat restless legs syndrome (RLS), a common neurological disorder affecting an estimated five million people in the UK, which causes an irresistible urge to move the legs.
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which → call → legs
It is often accompanied by uncomfortable sensations (such as crawling, pulling or tingling) that are triggered by rest or inactivity and worsen in the evening.
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that → accompany → evening
The impact can be life-changing, as Dorothy explains: ‘RLS wrecks your sleep – and consequently your waking life – as you can’t stop this constant moving.’
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you → change → moving
Dorothy Moate is regularly affected by an uncontrollable urge to shop, and her home is festooned with piles of new clothes that she does not need
But
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she → affect → that
what she didn’t expect was that the drugs she was given to combat RLS would wreck her life in other ways, as a result of a known potential side-effect – impulsive and compulsive behaviour.
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she → expect → effect
Worst of all, she says, is that after nine years of taking them, she’s struggled to come off them because of a crippling withdrawal symptom: severe anxiety.
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she → say → symptom
Campaigners say many others with RLS find themselves in a similar position.
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others → say → position
A petition calling for an inquiry into dopamine agonists says some patients have faced ‘ruined finances, family breakdown, dangerous impulse-control disorders, physical decline… and, in some cases, criminal proceedings’.
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patients → call → cases
Others have ended up taking legal action.
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Others → end → action
In 2024, Philip Stevens, 66, from Hampshire, received a £70,000 payout from his GP after being prescribed a dopamine agonist for RLS without being told of the risks it posed.
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it → receive → risks
He subsequently developed an impulse-control disorder that led to him spending thousands on gambling websites and expensive clothes which he hid from his wife.
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he → develop → wife
The number of patients who could be affected is huge.
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who → affect → patients
Dopamine agonists are not only prescribed for RLS, but also to treat Parkinson’s disease, hormone-secreting pituitary tumours and even depression.
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agonists → prescribe → disease
But it's feared that the number of people taking them is increasing – without them being aware of the risks.
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them → fear → risks
Data from NHS England shows that, in 2021, prescriptions for the three most commonly dispensed dopamine agonists – pramipexole, ropinirole and rotigotine – totalled 1.26 million; in 2025, that had risen to 1.37 million.
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that → show → million
Dopamine agonists mimic the effects of dopamine, a brain chemical that helps regulate physical movement.
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that → mimic → movement
The problem, as numerous studies show, is that dopamine also serves as a powerful ‘reward’ chemical in the brain.
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dopamine → show → brain
It spurs us to repeat actions that previously have sparked feelings of pleasure or success.
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that → spur → pleasure
This in turn can fuel impulsivity and addiction.
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This → fuel → impulsivity
Indeed, impulsive behaviours – including gambling, shopping, eating and inappropriate sexual acts – have long been recognised as side-effects of dopamine agonists.
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behaviours → include → agonists
These side-effects are experienced by 6 to 17 per cent of RLS patients taking the drugs, according to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the UK medicines watchdog.
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effects → experience → Excellence
And now mounting evidence shows that all patients, regardless of their medical problem, are at risk from the drugs.
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patients → mount → drugs
For example, among patients prescribed them for Parkinson’s disease, one in six is affected by impulse-control disorders, according to Parkinson’s UK.
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six → prescribe → UK
Such is the growing concern that in 2024 the American Academy of Sleep Medicine recommended that dopamine agonists not be used as a first-line treatment for RLS.
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agonists → grow → RLS
Yet the Dopamine Agonist Action Group, a new volunteer-led campaign, warns that UK patients are seldom warned of these potential dangers by their doctors (and they say the medicines’ information leaflets have failed to highlight the dangers adequately).
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leaflets → lead → dangers
This tallies with Dorothy’s experience.
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This → tally → experience
Having initially developed RLS when pregnant with her first baby at 35, she says ‘all the fidgeting robbed me of sleep – but after I had the baby the restless legs stopped’.
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legs → develop → baby
(This often happens with RLS related to pregnancy.)
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This → happen → pregnancy
However, the symptoms returned during the menopause.
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symptoms → return → menopause
‘I was bringing up two children and working as a teaching assistant,’ says Dorothy.
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Dorothy → bring → assistant
‘Restless legs robbed me of sleep, which made it very difficult to do my attention-demanding job.’
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it → rob → job
She and her husband of 40 years, Roy, 72, a retired associate professor in electron microscopy, had to move into separate bedrooms ‘so that his sleep was not disturbed’.
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sleep → have → bedrooms
…and 78 more, not listed.
The Aporia
