Small Study Finds Another Health Benefit In Chocolate

[Kadie]

Small Study Finds Another Health Benefit In Chocolate

Greek Researchers: Chocolate May Boost Blood Vessel Health

POSTED: 9:58 am EDT August 30, 2004

MUNICH, Germany -- There's more good news for chocolate lovers.

Scientists have found that eating dark chocolate appears to improve the function of important cells lining the wall of blood vessels for at least three hours.

The study, involving 17 healthy young volunteers who agreed to eat a bar of dark chocolate and then get an ultrasound, found that eating dark chocolate seemed to make the blood vessels more flexible, which helps prevent the hardening of the arteries that leads to heart attacks.

But experts cautioned that the weight gain from eating a lot of chocolate probably would cancel out the apparent benefit.

Dark chocolate is rich in flavonoids, which act as natural antioxidants -- chemicals that combat the damage oxygen does to the body. However, that does not mean that chocolate binges will ward off a heart attack, experts warn.

more...

http://www.thekcrachannel.com/health/3690805/detail.html


First they tell me it is good for me, then they tell me not to eat too much.

[liontamer]

1. there was a 130 year old woman

who said the secret to her long life was to eat a pound of chocolate a day. I say go for it!

[curse10]

2. First Red Wine, now dark chocolate

what next? cigarettes? :P

[KurtNYC]

3. A big difference between "dark chocolate" and hersheys

Milk chocolate is mostly sugar (HFCS) and dark chocolate is mostly cacao -- 50 to 80% cacao. So key would be to get the cacao without much sugar.

[supernova]

4. YOu can find dark chocolate

with sugar amounts as low as about 12g/per serving.

The best thing to do is get the unsweetened baking chocolate and add your own sweetner. I'd use Splenda.


edit: typos. Typing is unsafe before morning tea. :silly:

[Eurobabe]

5. Love these studies with small sample universe

they are about as meaningless as GOP polls.

[Snow]

6. Okay, it's monday morning & I'm feeling argumentative.....

it's not the size of the sample that's important, it's the size of the effect. If the association is strong enough, you can eliminate chance as a factor ("find statistical siginificance") even with very small sample sizes. The classic example is the original study of DES in mothers (used to prevent miscarriages) and clear cell adenocarcinoma of the vagina in their daughters as the daughter reached late teens. The sample size in that study was 17 young women with the cancer. And that was enough to open up the whole question, and after more studies, but not very many more, DES was banned.