A WOMAN has spoken of her shock on hearing that a drug given to large numbers of people battling Parkinson’s disease may have been responsible for wrecking her life.

Samantha Robson was left penniless after her husband Mark suffered a complete personality change.

After being diagnosed with Parkinson’s he became addicted to gambling and worked his way through tens of thousands of pounds, bankrupting his wife’s business and nearly costing them their Royton home.

It put a massive strain on the couple’s marriage and they were ultimately to divorce, with Samantha admitting she has spent years harbouring massive resentment to Mark.

However, it has now been revealed that American studies on Parkinson’s patients are said to have found that some people who received the ‘dopamine agonist’ drugs suffered personality changes, including compulsive disorders and obsessions with such things as gambling, shopping, food, or sex.

Samantha and Mark say they had no idea that the drug could trigger possible side effects.

Mark, who is now 53 and cared for by his father, has teamed up with two other UK Parkinson’s sufferers with similar stories, have launched a compensation claim against the manufacturer of the drug.

Samantha, 42, told the Advertiser this week that finding out there may be an explanation to what happened to her family is helping her rebuild her life.

"I believe I have been given the answers to things I struggled to get my head around for a long time," she said. "It is like finding a missing piece to a jigsaw. I am sure it was the medicine that was supposed to help Mark that turned him into a liar and a gambler, and he had no way of stopping it."

A decade ago Samantha and Mark had been happily married for three years and were living in their Rochdale Road home with Samantha’s daughter Jessica from a previous relationship.

Mark was a successful manager at British Aerospace, Chadderton, and Samantha was running a business supplying psychics to TV stations. However, at the age of 42 Mark was diagnosed with Parkinson’s and all changed. Mark began taking a cocktail of 25 tablets to delay the onset of tremors, and the loss of mobility and speech.

After two years of keeping his illness from his friends, family and employers, the symptoms started to show and he left work. Mark got involved in Samantha’s business, managing her website and accounts, but his personality had started to change.

Samantha said: "Mark became withdrawn and angry that I couldn’t always understand him when he spoke. He also began buying expensive things, which was totally out of character – and then came the betting."

Unbeknown to Samantha, what had started as a £5 bet through the TV and internet had rapidly increased to vast sums, as did the frequency of Mark’s gambling.At its height Mark won and lost £40,000 in 24 hours.

He had started a secret life, hiding unpaid bills, obtaining credit cards and taking loans out on their home. It resulted in debts of £80,000 and then in Samantha losing her business and going bankrupt.

When Mark refused to go to Gambler’s Anonymous Samantha asked him to leave and spoke to the police about pressing charges against her husband.

Eventually Mark was admitted to a psychiatric ward for three months where he was told similar cases had been reported by other Parkinson’s sufferers.

With his medication changed, Mark is no longer gambling, but he is left with gambling debts of £50,000 and is currently forming a compensation claim. Samantha has managed to buy her way out of her bankruptcy and save her home, but sadly there is no future for her and Mark.

"My anger is no longer aimed at Mark," she said. "I genuinely believe he’s a victim in all of this.  I don’t want anything out of his compensation case if he wins. All I want is to raise awareness of the fact that in this country there may well be medicines that help thousands of people – while also wrecking others’ lives."