Eating dark chocolates daily is good for heart and prevents diabetes

Here’s good news for those who crave for chocolates as a new study has revealed that eating dark chocolates every day may improve cardiovascular health. Study authors have conducted meta-analysis of 19 randomized control trials (RCTs) of cocoa consumption  and found it to lower the risk of cardiovascular diseases while it improves specific circulating biomarkers of cardiometabolic health in long run.

Researchers conducted the study over 1,139 participants. For the study, researchers conducted meta-analysis on whether dark chocolates rich in flavanol actually improves cardiovascular health. Study authors divided the participants into two groups– in the first group, participants were fed with dark chocolates while in the second group, participants were told not to consume any chocolate. Researchers then compared improvements in specific circulating biomarkers of cardiometabolic health of people in both the groups.

After rigorous analysis, researchers found that the cocoa flavanols does affect cardiovascular health and provides protection against diabetes and heart diseases in future. Lead study author and Professor at Brown University, Simin Liu said that dark chocolates have several other benefits like reduce dyslipidemia (elevated triglycerides), insulin resistance and systemic inflammation. All these diseases have a role to play in cardiometabolic diseases. Thus, RCTs make it clear that consuming dark chocolates also reduces the risk of cardiometabolic disease.

Study authors further added that consuming 200 and 600 milligrammes of flavanols per day had best results in the study. Participants those ate flavanol in the optimal range showed significant decline in blood sugar and insulin levels.

However, researchers pointed out the study is based on dark chocolates and it should not be generalized that all kinds of chocolates are good for health. Study on larger scale is required to confirm the find.

Previous study conducted by researchers from the Luxembourg Institute of Health, the University of Warwick Medical School, the University of South Australia and the University of Maine, has found that eating chocolate can prevent type 2 diabetes and insulin resistance which further reduces the risk of the cardiovascular diseases.

However, if your child eats too much chocolates, more than its peers then blame genes. You can’t do much to rectify his/her eating habits as it is due to genes that prompt your child to eat sweetened stuff again and again. This is because some kids have extra sensitive taste buds to detect sugar which prompts them more to eat sugary content so that they can get the same taste again. (Read More)

The study appeared in the journal of Nutrition.

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