Dark chocolate good for blood pressure – study

The latest study from the Polytechnic Institute of Coimbra in Portugal, led by Dr Telmo Pereira and published in the journal Nutrition suggests that just a few squares of dark chocolate a day will lower blood pressure in one month.

While admittedly a small study, researchers had 30 healthy adults, aged 18 to 27, eat 20g of dark chocolate every day for 30 days and saw dramatic changes as all the participants saw significant improvement to their blood pressure. Half of the participants had 55% cocoa chocolate, while the remainder had 90% and the effects were more dramatic in the high-cocoa group.

Those eating the high-cocoa chocolate saw their systolic blood pressure go down by 3.5 mmHg, compared to 2.4 mmHg in the lower-cocoa group. Diastolic blood pressure was reduced by 2.3 mmHg and 1.7 mmHg, respectively. The higher-cocoa group also had healthier pulse rates and ventricular-arterial coupling.

Future studies should look at how chocolate interacts with the rest of our diet to influence our wellbeing, they claim.

They should also uncover exactly how cocoa benefits our heart and the optimal amount to eat.

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