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eating the right kind of chocolate is the key to getting the health results that you want.
Chocolate and cocoa are in the news again. Antioxidants in chocolate & cocoa can help your heart by keeping your blood vessels relaxed, easing blood pressure and helping circulation. Poor blood vessel function is recognized as an early stage in the development process of cardiovascular diseases, including coronary artery disease (CAD). Based on research in the U.S. and Germany, cocoa flavonoids tend to improve blood vessel function in patients with coronary artery disease. You need the right chocolate however.
Flavonoids are found in many plants, including onions, broccoli, and tea. Chocolate is often touted in the same way, but often has lots of fat, which means that consumption should be limited. Cocoa stands alone as an extraordinary source of flavonoids.
Should you run to the store and buy all the cocoa you can find? Hardly. For starters, cocoa's flavonoids taste bitter and often get destroyed in processing to make cocoa taste better. Knowing flavenoid content of the chocolate you are eating is important, and that information isn't being made public in an accurate way. Mars recently funded a study proving the benefits, but so far, manufacturers have not most made the upgrade to high flavonoids in most chocolate and cocoa. Right now, almost nobody is selling this kind of a product in most grocery stores. However, they are available in many boutique food stores and chocolate specialty shops. For you to be properly informed, reading product labels and a little research will be a must to find the right product. Eating "dark chocolate" that much of the publicity out there heralds isn't a sure answer for your well being. The bottom line when buying healthy chocolate is a minimum "cacoa or cocoa content" of 55% or more. The more the better for sufficient flavonoid content in chocolate. This is not the cheap chocolate that you pick up at check-out aisle of your grocery or convenience store. The news media is telling you to eat chocolate bars without informing you with the details, which should be a crime, as it is likely to simply promote obesity while the nation rests in the midst of an alarming health crisis.
Test results show that healthy young men who drank beverages made from cocoa powder that was high or low in a type of flavonoid, called flavonols. In testing, each man tried one of the drinks after an overnight fast. More than two days later, they fasted again and then tried the other drink. Their blood vessels relaxed more after drinking the flavonoid-richer cocoa.
Next, scientists isolated and purified cocoa's flavonols. Some participants received a drink containing those flavonols; others water without flavonols. Blood vessels were more relaxed after drinking flavonols but not pure water. That finding suggests that those particular flavonols, instead of something else in cocoa, are important.
Cardiovascular disease is one of the leading causes of mortality and disability in many parts of the world, especially in Western countries like the U.S. . It accounts for one-fifth of all mortality in the States.
The results of the research, which are published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, found that daily cocoa flavonol consumption more than doubled the number of circulating angiogenic cells (CAC) in the blood. CACs have been shown to have vessel repair and maintenance functions, which contribute to healthy blood vessels. Researchers said that increasing levels of CACs have also been associated with a decreased risk of death from cardiovascular disease, citing a 2005 study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
In a randomized, controlled, double-masked, cross-over trial, 16 CAD patients, aged between 61 and 67 received a dietary high-flavonol cocoa drink or a low-flavonol nutrient-matched control cocoa drink, twice a day for 30 days. The cocoa drinks were well tolerated and none of the patients experienced major adverse events, cardiovascular-specific events, or hospitalization during the study period. The results showed that blood vessel function improved by 47% compared to low-flavonol consumption. Dietary flavonoids improve repair mechanisms, while acting in synergy with medical therapy, as well as vessel flow dilation which is a measure of cardiovascular health.
The authors of the study said that the outcomes of their trial demonstrated that drinking high-flavonol cocoa significantly reduces systolic blood pressure, an important risk factor for heart disease and stroke. Instead of depending on cocoa flavonoids or pills, changing modern lifestyle and diet is the key to ongoing good health. Buying and consuming the wrong product could be harmful to your health, or at best, negate the benefits of any flavonoids you get from the chocolate. Remember, it's all about flavonoid content versus fat where chocolate is concerned. Sugar content is also important. Don't fall for popular advertising and the mainstream media that blindly promote snippets of truth. Be a skeptic and check out claims. You owe it to yourself!
The scientific community continues to take interest in the types and levels of flavonoids in foods because of the consistent evidence of beneficial health effects of dietary flavonoids. Flavonoids and proanthocyanidins, are associated with reduction in the risk of cardiovascular disease by increasing the release of endothelial nitric oxide, as well as the vasodilatation of arteries and capillaries. Anthocyanidins can also protect LDL cholesterol oxidation through their high antioxidant activity. While the U.S. government is reluctant to give easily found accurate directions on the American diet that truly assist the health of Americans because of a great conflict of interest that exists between government and the food industry, don't forget that great benefits can be derived from eating a proper diet of fresh fruit and vegetables, as well as introducing a Mediterranean diet over what most Americans eat. A healthy chocolate is 'icing on the cake.'
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reference: Reuter article which promotes "more cocoa," which is better than past news advertising, but still doesn't inform the chocolate fan or those that seek better health and a little sweet stuff.
