Author(s): Xiao Deng, Bin Xiao and Eng-King Tan
Rotigotine is a nonergoline dopamine agonist which can be used to treat Parkinson’s disease (PD) through a transdermal patch, the first such formulation available worldwide. There is limited information on reasons for withdrawal and potential adverse effects of rotigotine in different ethnic populations. Outpatients with PD prescribed with rotigotine patch as an add-on therapy were included and followed up for 6 months. The withdrawal reasons were recorded down in the patients who subsequently dropped out of the patch therapy. All of the patients were followed up for the adverse effects. In total, 29 patients in the withdrawal group and 18 patients in the continual group were identified during a period of 6 months. The main reasons for withdrawal were financial burden and perception from PD patients that the drug was not better compared to other current medications. The most commonly reported side effects of rotigotine patch were application site reactions. There was no significant difference with regard to the incidence of side effects between the withdrawal group and continual group (31.03%, 9/29 vs. 44.44%, 8/18, P=0.35). Taken together, our study showed that adverse effects were not the main causes of rotigotine patch withdrawal. The relatively low dosage of rotigotine patch used by our doctors may account for the perception of lack of efficiency in some patients. Our observations will provide useful experience for clinical application of the rotigotine patch in the future.
