09.29.09
Indication: Heart attack
Source: J Intern Med, September 2009;266(3):248-57.
Research: To assess the long-term effects of chocolate consumption among patients with established coronary heart disease, researchers conducted a population-based inception cohort study. They followed 1169 non-diabetic patients hospitalized with a confirmed first acute myocardial infarction (AMI) between 1992 and 1994 in Stockholm County, Sweden, as part of the Stockholm Heart Epidemiology Program. Participants self-reported usual chocolate consumption over the preceding 12 months with a standardized questionnaire distributed during hospitalization and underwent a health examination 3 months after discharge. Participants were followed for hospitalizations and mortality with national registries for 8 years.
Results: Chocolate consumption generally had an inverse but weak association with total mortality and nonfatal outcomes. In contrast, intake of other sweets was not associated with cardiac or total mortality. Chocolate consumption, researchers found, was associated with lower cardiac mortality in a dose dependent manner in patients free of diabetes surviving their first AMI. Although the findings support increasing evidence that chocolate is a rich source of beneficial bioactive compounds, researchers believe confirmation of this strong inverse relationship from other observational studies or large-scale, long-term, controlled randomized trials is needed.