To print: Select File and then Print from your browser's menu --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Title: High-Flavanol Cocoa May Improve Cardiovascular Health in Patients With Diabetes URL: http://www.pslgroup.com/dg/221F0E.htm Doctor's Guide May 26, 2008
WASHINGTON, DC -- May 26, 2008 -- According to new research published in the June 3 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC), after patients with diabetes drank specially formulated high-flavanol cocoa for 1 month, blood vessel function went from severely impaired to normal. "Medical treatments alone often do not prevent complications of diabetes that are associated with atherosclerosis and cardiovascular disease," said Malte Kelm, MD, Professor and Chairman of Cardiology, Pulmonology, and Vascular Medicine, University Hospital Aachen and the Technical University Aachen, Aachen, Germany. "Physicians should be increasingly looking to lifestyle changes and new approaches to help in addressing the cardiovascular risks associated with diabetes." Dr. Kelm and his colleagues first tested the feasibility of using high-flavanol cocoa to improve cardiovascular health by observing, on 3 separate days, the effects of cocoa with varying amounts of flavanols on blood vessel function in 10 patients with stable type 2 diabetes. The second, larger part of the study tested the effectiveness of long-term, routine consumption of high-flavanol cocoa in comparison with low-flavanol cocoa in 41 patients with stable type 2 diabetes. Patients were randomly assigned to drink cocoa with either 321 mg of flavanols per serving or only 25 mg of flavanols per serving 3 times daily for 30 days. The 2 types of cocoa tasted and looked the same, despite differences in flavanol content. In addition, neither patients nor investigators were aware of which type of cocoa each patient had been assigned to drink. Blood vessel function was tested on the first day before the patients consumed any cocoa and again 2 hours after drinking the beverage. The test was repeated before and after cocoa consumption on day 8 and day 30. Researchers used flow-mediated dilation (FMD) to evaluate the ability of arteries to dilate in response to an increase in the demand for blood, oxygen, and nutrients. FMD measurements can provide valuable information about a person's cardiovascular health. Previous studies have shown that people with an impaired FMD response have an increased risk of heart attack, need for bypass surgery or catheter procedure to open clogged coronary arteries, and even death from heart disease. In Dr. Kelm's laboratory, a normal FMD response among healthy people, in the same age range as those participating in the study, was a 5.2% expansion in arterial diameter, on average. The researchers found that patients with type 2 diabetes had a severely impaired FMD response at the beginning of the study. Before patients consumed any cocoa, arteries expanded by only 3.3%, on average. Two hours after drinking high-flavanol cocoa, the FMD response was 4.8%. Over time, those findings improved. After patients drank high-flavanol cocoa 3 times daily for 8 days, the average FMD response improved to 4.1% at baseline and to 5.7% 2 hours after cocoa ingestion. By day 30, the FMD response had improved to 4.3% at baseline and 5.8% after cocoa ingestion. All of the improvements were highly statistically significant. Among patients who consumed low-flavanol cocoa, there were no significant differences in baseline FMD response over time, or in FMD response after cocoa ingestion on days 8 and 30. Dr. Kelm speculated that cocoa flavanols improve FMD response by increasing the production of nitric oxide. The high-flavanol cocoa used in this study, which provided many times more flavanols than the typical US dietary intake of 20 to 100 mg daily, is not sold in the supermarket. Dr. Kelm cautioned that the take-home message of the study is not that people with diabetes should guzzle cocoa, but rather, that dietary flavanols hold promise as a way to prevent heart disease. "Patients with type 2 diabetes can certainly find ways to fit chocolate into a healthy lifestyle, but this study is not about chocolate, and it's not about urging those with diabetes to eat more chocolate. This research focuses on what's at the true heart of the discussion on 'healthy chocolate'—it's about cocoa flavanols, the naturally occurring compounds in cocoa," he said. "While more research is needed, our results demonstrate that dietary flavanols might have an important impact as part of a healthy diet in the prevention of cardiovascular complications in diabetic patients." Umberto Campia, MD, who co-wrote an editorial about the new study in the same issue of JACC, noted that patients with diabetes are an ideal population in which to study the effects of flavanols on arterial function, because high glucose levels damage the endothelium and because these patients have a high risk of cardiovascular disease. Dr. Campia is a Senior Research Associate, Cardiovascular Core Lab, Medstar Research Institute, Washington, DC. "This study is important and thought provoking," he noted. "We now have sizeable evidence that cocoa flavanols have a positive effect on the health of the arteries. This is the foundation we need for doing a much larger prospective study that looks at the effect of cocoa flavanols not just on endothelial function, but also on the risk of heart attack, stroke, and other serious forms of cardiovascular disease." SOURCE: American College of Cardiology --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright © 1999 P\S\L Consulting Group Inc. All rights reserved. Republication or redistribution of P\S\L content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of P\S\L. P\S\L shall not be liable for any errors, omissions or delays in this content or any other content on its sites, newsletters or other publications, nor for any decisions or actions taken in reliance on such content. --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This news story was printed from *Doctor's Guide to the Internet* located at http://www.docguide.com --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Return to News Story Page This site is maintained by webmaster@pslgroup.com Please contact us with any comments, problems or bugs. 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