Drug + (side effect) or Nutrition + health

To all:
I was watching some TV when a new drug commercial came on. Nothing new as the drug company makes mills off this. Anyway, my point is this new drug "Requip" is for a symptom called "Restless Legs Syndrome." Please do not take this drug if you feel like you may have this. (1) This can be helped simply with Iron supplements or eating more foods with iron in them. Also take vitamin C and E to protect against oxidation of the iron.

From a classmate in school who wrote me about her RLS:

I just wanted to let you know restless leg syndrome is sometimes iron insufficiency; however most of the time it's actually magnesium. I have several patients, as well as myself, that suffered from restless leg syndrome and in all cases, Magnesium supplementation was much more effective than iron and totally resolved it. Plus, many women who get restless leg syndromes also have GI complaints. What the correlation is I'm not sure. But adding Iron increases or can cause constipation and or nausea. Magnesium has the opposite effect (it softens stool) so is good to recommend to pts with GI or constipation problems. Also, Mg has been found that it alleviates depression in women. This is an incidental finding but one of my patients (I didn't tell her about it's affects on depression) commented that she felt much happier and less down than she normally does after supplementing the Mg for about 3 weeks. So to make a long story short, Mg is some good stuff! .
Your friend in health
XXXXXX XXXXX (confidentiality)

Please tell any of your friends or family members who feel the need to get this drug. There is no need for them unless you want the side effects from it which you may not have the restless legs but you can now fall asleep during activities of daily living, bouts of fainting and slowed heart rate, hallucinations, and many more for you to read about http://us.gsk.com/products/assets/us_requip.pdf
So please. What would you rather do? Take some supplements of iron, magnesium, Vit. C and E and feel fine plus improve other parts of your body as well. Or take a drug that "treats" restless legs but then have to take more drugs for the other side effects that your body is responding to the drug with?

Please, all I ask is that you always educate yourself before taking any drugs/supplements/herbs. Your life is at stake and is important to so many others as well. Do the research on everything, it's out there waiting for you.

~Intern Allison Patton


(1) Mosby's Handbook of Herbs and Supplements and their Therapeutic Uses; Bratman MD, Girman MD, MPH; pg.290-292