Chocolate addiction leads to sweet discovery/more on choc : )

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Chocolate addiction leads to sweet discovery

 

 

 

November 15 2006 at 02:00AM

 

 

 

 

 

 

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=117 & art_id=qw1163538364192B243

By Maggie FoxWashington - They were so addicted, they just could not give up their favourite daily snack - not even in the interest of science.But chocolate lovers who flunked out of a Johns Hopkins University study on aspirin and heart disease helped researchers stumble on an explanation of why a little chocolate a day can cut the risk of heart attack.It turns out chocolate, like aspirin, affects the platelets that cause blood to clot, Diane Becker of the Johns Hopkins University's School of Medicine and her colleagues discovered."What these chocolate offenders taught us is that the chemical in cocoa beans has a biochemical effect similar to aspirin in reducing platelet clumping, which can be fatal if a clot forms and blocks a blood vessel, causing a heart attack," Becker said in a telephone interview.The 139 so-called chocolate offenders took part in a larger study of 1 200 people with a family history of heart disease. The study looked at the effects of aspirin on blood platelets.Before they got the aspirin, the volunteers were asked to stay on a strict regimen of exercise, refrain from smoking and avoid caffeinated drinks, wine, grapefruit juice and chocolate.Chocolate and the other foods are known to affect platelets."We knew they would offend," Becker said. "Some people said to us, 'I can do anything but I can't stay off my chocolate'.""If people said, 'I will try my very best,' we said, 'okay do your very best, but it is crucial that you don't eat chocolate for 24 to 48 hours before you come in for testing.'"Yet some people failed even this test of self-control."Nobody ate like a chocolate chip. If they were going to eat it, they ate some chocolate," Becker said."It went all the way from from a chocolate chip cookie to someone who ate a gallon of chocolate ice cream with chocolate chunks and two chocolate-chip cookies at one sitting."Becker cut them out of the aspirin study, but looked at their blood anyway.Researchers ran platelet samples from both groups through a mechanical blood vessel system designed to time how long it takes for the platelets to clump together in a hair-thin plastic tube.The blood of the chocolate eaters was slower to clot than the blood of the volunteers who resisted chocolate, Becker told a meeting of heart experts in Chicago.In a urine test, the chocolate lovers had lower levels of a platelet waste product called thromboxane."Does it help a little bit? Yes," Becker said. "But it does not have anywhere near the magnitude of the effects of a single baby aspirin a day."Nonetheless, Becker's team wants to study the effects of eating chocolate on a "free-living" population of volunteers. They will measure how much chocolate people eat and then watch them for several years to see if chocolate-eaters have a different rate of heart attacks, stroke and heart operations.Other studies have suggested that dark chocolate contains more of the beneficial compounds linked with heart health, and experts note that the high sugar and fat content of most chocolate candy might cancel out some of the benefits.

 

 

Now you have an excuse to munch chocolate..

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1148508007840B243

 

 

 

May 25 2006 at 12:37AM

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Megan RauscherNew York - Chocolate lovers, rejoice! A new study hints that eating milk chocolate may boost brain function."Chocolate contains many substances that act as stimulants, such as theobromine, phenethylamine, and caffeine," Dr Bryan Raudenbush from Wheeling Jesuit University in West Virginia noted in comments to Reuters Health."These substances by themselves have previously been found to increase alertness and attention and what we have found is that by consuming chocolate you can get the stimulating effects, which then lead to increased mental performance."To study the effects of various chocolate types on brain power, Raudenbush and colleagues had a group of volunteers consume, on four separate occasions, 85g of milk chocolate; 85g of dark chocolate; 85g of carob; and nothing (the control condition).After a 15-minute digestive period, participants completed a variety of computer-based neuropsychological tests designed to assess cognitive performance including memory, attention span, reaction time, and problem solving."Composite scores for verbal and visual memory were significantly higher for milk chocolate than the other conditions," Raudenbush told Reuters Health. And consumption of milk and dark chocolate was associated with improved impulse control and reaction time.Previous research has shown that some nutrients in food aid in glucose release and increased blood flow, which may augment cognitive performance. The current findings, said Raudenbush, "provide support for nutrient release via chocolate consumption to enhance cognitive performance".

 

Chocolate a day keeps heart healthy - study

 

 

 

December 20 2005 at 07:11AM

 

 

 

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1135081082763B243

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

December 20 2005 at 07:11AM

 

 

 

 

 

 

London - A few squares of dark chocolate every day might cut the risk of serious heart disease by helping to stave off the hardening of arteries, according to a study published on Tuesday.Researchers from University Hospital in Zurich studied 20 male smokers, who are at greater risk of hardening arteries characteristic of coronary heart disease, to see the effects of dark and white chocolate on arterial blood flow.The group, who were asked to abstain from eating foods rich in anti-oxidants for 24 hours, were given 40 grams of chocolate to eat.After two hours, ultrasound scans revealed that dark chocolate - made up of 74 percent cocoa solids - significantly improved the smoothness of arterial flow, whilst white chocolate, with four percent cocoa, had no effect, the study published in Heart magazine said.The researchers, who said further studies were needed, suggested that the possible benefits arose from the anti-oxidants in dark chocolate."Only a small daily treat of dark chocolate may substantially increase the amount of anti-oxidant intake and beneficially affect vascular health," the report's authors said.

 

 

 

http://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1163580481950R131

Chocolate works like aspirin - study

 

 

 

November 15 2006 at 11:04AM

 

 

 

 

 

 

Washington - A few bites of dark chocolate a day can have the same benefit as aspirin in reducing blood clots and preventing heart attacks, researchers said on Tuesday in a study of chocolate lovers."What these chocolate 'offenders' taught us is that the chemical in cocoa beans has a biochemical effect similar to aspirin in reducing platelet clumping which can be fatal if a clot forms and blocks a blood vessel, causing a heart attack," lead researcher Diane Becker told the annual conference of the American Heart Association, in Chicago.The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine professor cautioned that her work is not intended as a prescription to gobble up huge amounts of chocolate candy laced with health offending substances like sugar, butter and cream.However, she said that two tablespoons a day of dark chocolate, meaning the purest form of the candy made from dried extract of roasted cocoa beans, may be just what the doctor ordered.For almost 20 years, scientists have known that dark chocolate, rich in chemicals called flavonoids, lowers blood pressure and has other beneficial effects on blood flow.Becker's findings show that normal, everyday doses of chocolate found in ordinary foods is enough to provide clot-controlling benefit, rather than the kilos (several pounds) of chocolate earlier studies said were needed for flavonoids to have a significant effect."Eating a little bit of chocolate or having a drink of hot cocoa as part of a regular diet is probably good for personal health, so long as people don't eat too much of it, and too much of the kind with lots of butter and sugar," said Becker.The study is based on tests conducted on 139 subjects who were disqualified from an earlier, larger study on the effects of aspirin on blood platelets because they did not refrain from eating chocolate.Their "offence," researchers said, led to what is believed to be the first biochemical explanation of why people who eat a few pieces of chocolate a day lower their risk of dying of a heart attack by almost one half. - Sapa-AFP

 

Another reason to chew on chocolate...

 

 

 

March 01 2006 at 05:45AM

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Carla K. Johnsonhttp://www.int.iol.co.za/index.php?set_id=1 & click_id=31 & art_id=qw1141183803858B251

Chicago - Leave it to the Dutch to help demonstrate the health benefits of chocolate.A study of older men in The Netherlands, known for its luscious chocolate, indicated those who ate the equivalent of one-third of a chocolate bar every day had lower blood pressure and a reduced risk of death.The findings, published in Monday's Archives of Internal Medicine, are based on data collected for more than a decade on Dutch men who were ages 65 and older in 1985.Researchers examined the eating habits of 470 healthy men who were not taking blood pressure medicine. The men who ate the most products made from cocoa beans - including cocoa drinks, chocolate bars and chocolate pudding - had lower blood pressure and a 50 percent lower risk of death.The researchers say, however, it's too early to conclude it was chocolate that led to better health. The men who ate more cocoa products could have shared other qualities that made them healthier. Experts also point out that eating too much chocolate can make you fat - a risk for both heart disease and high blood pressure."It's way too early to make recommendations about whether people should eat more cocoa or chocolate," said Brian Buijsse, a nutritional epidemiologist at Wageningen University in The Netherlands, who co-authored the study.Still, the Dutch study, supported by grants from the Netherlands Prevention Foundation, appears to be the largest so far to document a health effect for cocoa beans. And it confirms findings of smaller, shorter-term studies that also linked chocolate with lower blood pressure.Cocoa beans contain flavanols, which are thought to increase nitric oxide in the blood and improve the function of blood vessels."This is a very important article providing epidemiological support for what many researchers have been observing in experimental models," said Cesar Fraga of the University of California Davis, who does similar research but was not involved in the new study.Buijsse noted the men eating the most cocoa products were not heavier or bigger eaters than the men who ate less cocoa.Could the study results apply to women?"Our study consisted of elderly men," Buijsse said. "If you look at the other interventional studies, you see the same effects in men and women, younger people and older people. It may be the findings are generalisable to women, but you never know." - Sapa-AP