Hands and feet feeling cold?
Here’s how a ‘chocolate pill’ can help blood flow to the extremities this winter
DO YOU have cold extremities? Are you finding it hard to warm up your hands and feet?
Poor blood flow could be the cause, but powerful evidence has now emerged that chocolate (pictured right) could be the answer.
The findings of the study — carried out at King’s College London and published in the prestigious American Journal of Clinical Nutrition — is the best indication so far that chemicals called flavanols, found in chocolate, could be the right choice for people looking to maintain normal blood flow.
Narrowing of the arteries causes high blood pressure, which now affects one in four adults and 70 per cent of people over the age of 65.
It also results in cold extremities because not enough warm blood can reach the hands and feet.
The study involved a monthlong comparison of blood pressure readings in healthy men aged 18 to 35.
Those taking a high dose of cocoa flavanols experienced positive results, which supports European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) claims that the compounds contribute to normal blood flow.
H oweve r , Dr Ana Rodriguez-Mateos, a lecturer in nutrition who led the study, warns: ‘You would have to eat huge quantities of chocolate to get this level of flavanols, and even if you tried you’d be cancelling out any benefit by eating vast amounts of extra fat and sugar at the same time.’
This is an issue, as poor diet is making high blood pressure more common.
A Cambridge supplement company has solved the conundrum by creating a calorie-free way to boost circulation with a supplement containing cocoa flavanols. A daily dose of this ‘chocolate pill’ contains the same amount of cocoa flavanols as 400g of high-quality cocoa chocolate, equivalent to 2,120 calories.
Professor Alf Lindberg, former secretary to the committee of the Nobel prize for medicine or physiology, said: ‘We are delighted that it is the first cocoa flavanol product officially allowed to claim it benefits blood vessel elasticity.’