Cocoa ingestion protects plasma lipids in healthy males against ex vivo oxidative conditions: A randomized clinical trial

The effects of in vivo cocoa-based supplementation were studied as a preconditioning treatment for ex vivo acute oxidative conditions in a controlled randomized clinical trial. Subjects were 100 healthy young men at Universidad Industrial de Santander blinded to the intervention and divided into two groups: The intervention group (n = 50) receiving 30 g of cocoa powder and 50 g of dark chocolate/d for 1 week with the remaining subjects receiving placebo. Cocoa products preconditioning for 1 week resulted in modifications in the susceptibility of plasma lipids over ex vivo oxidative conditions with effects of i) a significant increase in the oxidative resistance of plasma lipids measured by dienes formation (4.2, CI: 0.18, 8.2; P = 0.04), and ii) a significant reduction in the production of toxic aldehydes as established by a decrease in the content of hexanal, quantified by gas chromatography (−0.22, CI: −0.38, −0.05; P = 0.009). The in vivo cocoa-based preconditioning demonstrated protective properties against ex vivo oxidative modifications, improving total plasma lipids resistance to oxidation and protecting plasma lipids against great acute oxidative insult in comparison with placebo. This trial was registered at clinical clinicaltrials.gov as NCT01347450.