Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Meta-Analysis
. 2016 Aug;26(8):722-34.
doi: 10.1016/j.numecd.2016.01.003. Epub 2016 Jan 28.

Habitual chocolate consumption and the risk of incident heart failure among healthy men and women

C S Kwok  1 , Y K Loke  2 , A A Welch  2 , R N Luben  3 , M A H Lentjes  3 , S M Boekholdt  4 , R Pfister  5 , M A Mamas  6 , N J Wareham  7 , K-T Khaw  3 , P K Myint  8
Affiliations
Meta-Analysis

Habitual chocolate consumption and the risk of incident heart failure among healthy men and women

C S Kwok et al. Nutr Metab Cardiovasc Dis. 2016 Aug.

Abstract

Background: We aimed to examine the association between chocolate intake and the risk of incident heart failure in a UK general population. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis to quantify this association.

Methods and results: We used data from a prospective population-based study, the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer (EPIC)-Norfolk cohort. Chocolate intake was quantified based on a food frequency questionnaire obtained at baseline (1993-1997) and incident heart failure was ascertained up to March 2009. We supplemented the primary data with a systematic review and meta-analysis of studies which evaluated risk of incident heart failure with chocolate consumption. A total of 20,922 participants (53% women; mean age 58 ± 9 years) were included of whom 1101 developed heart failure during the follow up (mean 12.5 ± 2.7 years, total person years 262,291 years). After adjusting for lifestyle and dietary factors, we found 19% relative reduction in heart failure incidence in the top (up to 100 g/d) compared to the bottom quintile of chocolate consumption (HR 0.81 95%CI 0.66-0.98) but the results were no longer significant after controlling for comorbidities (HR 0.87 95%CI 0.71-1.06). Additional adjustment for potential mediators did not attenuate the results further. We identified five relevant studies including the current study (N = 75,408). The pooled results showed non-significant 19% relative risk reduction of heart failure incidence with higher chocolate consumption (HR 0.81 95%CI 0.66-1.01).

Conclusions: Our results suggest that higher chocolate intake is not associated with subsequent incident heart failure.

Keywords: Chocolate; Cocoa; Epidemiology; Heart failure; Meta-analysis.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Search strategy and study selection.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Meta-analysis of chocolate consumption and incident heart failure.
None
None
None
None
None
None
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Desch S., Schmidt J., Kobler D., Sonnabend M., Eitel I., Sareban M. Effect of cocoa products on blood pressure: systematic review and meta-analysis. Am J Hypertens. 2010;23:97–103. - PubMed
    1. Hooper L., Kroon P.A., Rimm E.B., Cohn J.S., Harvey I., Le Cornu K.A. Flavonoids, flavonoid-rich foods, and cardiovascular risk: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials. Am J Clin Nutr. 2008;88:38–50. - PubMed
    1. Buijsse B., Feskens E.J., Kok F.J., Kromhout D. Cocoa intake, blood pressure, and cardiovascular mortality: the Zutphen Elderly Study. Arch Intern Med. 2006;166:411–417. - PubMed
    1. Buijsse B., Weikert C., Drogan D., Bergmann M., Boeing H. Chocolate consumption in relation to blood pressure and risk of cardiovascular disease in German adults. Eur Heart J. 2010;31:1616–1623. - PubMed
    1. Latham L.S., Hensen Z.K., Minor D.S. Chocolate – guilty pleasure of healthy supplement. J Clin Hypertens (Greenwich) 2014;16:101–106. - PMC - PubMed