Unpleasant news for dark chocolate lovers

In an unpleasant news for chocolate lovers, researchers revealed that eating dark chocolate will not improve vision, contrary to the findings of a previous report.

The previous report indicated that certain elements of vision improved within two hours of eating chocolate, but the new study does not reveal any changes in vision or blood flow to the eye after eating about 200 grams of dark chocolate.

The studies were conducted on a small group of volunteers.

Dr. Jakob Schiedlitz of Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich, who led the research team, said that with two conflicting results after a small-scale trial, "more research is needed."

"Because this small study does not exclude the possibility of benefits, more large-scale studies are needed to confirm or deny long-term benefits," Schidlitz wrote in the report in the Journal of the American Medical Association of Ophthalmology.

The reason dark chocolate is thought to improve vision is that it is rich in flavonoids, an antioxidant.

Studies have shown that taking antioxidant-rich substances may reduce the risk of age-related vision problems called muscle atrophy.

The researchers pointed out that the flavonoids found in dark chocolate also contribute to the expansion of the arteries.

Flavanol
To confirm this, Schiedlitz and colleagues conducted a study of 22 healthy volunteers between the ages of 20 and 62 who had no vision problems.

They were randomly selected to eat about 20 grams of dark chocolate containing 400 milligrams of flavanol, a flavonide derivative or 7.5 grams of milk chocolate with about five milligrams of flavanol.

Doctors examined the volunteers' eyes two hours before and after chocolate, and the team was focusing on indications that chocolate caused the arteries to expand in the retina, meaning blood flow improved.

The volunteers also underwent simple visual tests as in the previous study.

When analyzing the data, no significant differences were found in retinal examinations or visual tests after the volunteers consumed dark chocolate or milk chocolate.

But Dr. Gareth Lima, an eye surgeon at Mount Sinai Eye and Ear Hospital in New York, said that although the study showed no benefit in consuming a single piece of chocolate, "it does not mean that long-term eating is not helpful."