Short-term human trials have shown that daily ingestion of dark
chocolate and high-flavanol cocoa can improve insulin sensitivity
in humans. These findings are consistent with evidence from
laboratory and animal studies showing that flavanols in cocoa can
improve glucose metabolism. To date there has only been one
epidemiological analysis of the association between a long-term
chocolate habit and diabetes e by Oba et al.5 They conducted a
prospective Cox Regression analysis using a cohort of 13,540 Japanese
community residents. They found a significant inverse association
with a 35% lower risk of diabetes incidence in male, but
not female, participants during a 10-year follow up.
The objective of the present analysis was to explore the prospective
association between a long-term chocolate habit and
diabetes risk in the U.S. by using data from the Atherosclerosis Risk
in Communities (ARIC) Cohort. The hypothesis was that the
association between chocolate intake and the risk of diabetes
would be the same as in Oba et al.’s study e inverse and stronger in
males than females.