Chocolate study

[arcticpenguin]

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,5744,7080890%5E1702,00.html

A SMALL German study suggests that eating dark chocolate can lower your blood pressure - a delicious instance in which something that tastes good might, for a change, be good for you, too.

Sounds intriguiging, but look at the numbers:

Thirteen adults with untreated mild hypertension got to eat 85 gram chocolate bars every day for two weeks. Half of the patients got white chocolate, half got dark chocolate.

Dark chocolate contains plant substances called polyphenols - ingredients scientists think are responsible for the heart-healthy attributes of red wine. Polyphenols also have been shown to lower blood pressure in animals.

Blood pressure remained pretty much unchanged in the group that ate white chocolate, which does not contain polyphenols. But after two weeks, systolic blood pressure - the top number - had dropped an average of five points in the dark-chocolate group.

The lower, or diastolic, reading fell an average of almost two points.

The participants had an average blood pressure reading of about 153 over 84.

This study is based on 13 patients and it's already being written up in newspapers? The drop in blood pressure was 2 points? Would any medical folk care to comment on the accuracy and precision of blood pressure testing?

 

[BTox]

With the given average, those reductions sound like within testing error and I'm sure are clinically irrelevant.

 

[teddygrahams]

That won't keep me from self-medicating.

 

[BTox]

Same here

 

[arcticpenguin]

I heard a report of this on NPR this morning. I think it's irresponsible to report on this until a larger, more definitive study is done.

 

[Eos of the Eons]

I would say dark chocolate is better for you than white chocolate, but the study didn't find anything conclusive. It might help to do the study again. I will volunteer for free chocolate!

Hey, was there any weight gain in either group?

Guess not:

Taubert said participants ate the chocolate bars instead of the sweets they usually consumed, and thus did not gain weight during the study.

Yay! so, who's gonna start the canadian version of the study?

 

[SquishyDave]

What confuses me is that half of them got light chocolate, and half dark, but the study was on 13 people

Something doesn't add up.