Healthier Living Thread Part IV

[color=#003399]effect of cocoa and tea intake on blood pressure

[color=#003399]a meta-analysis

dirk taubert, md, phd; renate roesen, phd; edgar schömig, md

arch intern med. 2007;167:626-634.

background epidemiological evidence suggests blood pressure-lowering effects of cocoa and tea. we undertook a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials to determine changes in systolic and diastolic blood pressure due to the intake of cocoa products or black and green tea.

methods medline, embase, scopus, science citation index, and the cochrane controlled trials register were searched from 1966 until october 2006 for studies in parallel group or crossover design involving 10 or more adults in whom blood pressure was assessed before and after receiving cocoa products or black or green tea for at least 7 days.

results five randomized controlled studies of cocoa administration involving a total of 173 subjects with a median duration of 2 weeks were included. after the cocoa diets, the pooled mean systolic and diastolic blood pressure were -4.7 mm hg (95% confidence interval [ci], -7.6 to -1.8 mm hg; p = .002) and -2.8 mm hg (95% ci, -4.8 to -0.8 mm hg; p = .006) lower, respectively, compared with the cocoa-free controls. five studies of tea consumption involving a total of 343 subjects with a median duration of 4 weeks were selected. the tea intake had no significant effects on blood pressure. the estimated pooled changes were 0.4 mm hg (95% ci, -1.3 to 2.2 mm hg; p = .63) in systolic and -0.6 mm hg (95% ci, -1.5 to 0.4 mm hg; p = .38) in diastolic blood pressure compared with controls.

conclusion current randomized dietary studies indicate that consumption of foods rich in cocoa may reduce blood pressure, while tea intake appears to have no effect.

Sarah, way to go, girl!!! I bet that feels mahvelous to pass that off. Woo hoo! I liked my OB clinicals, although some students didn't I think the difference was that the other clinical instructor focused more on post-partum care and pretty much just had the students doing assessments and vital signs.

Our teacher rocked. Her philosophy was that we wouldn't be there if we didn't know what to do and that we would be an asset to the nurses, not an extra task. Instead of assigning us patients, she let us pick and choose--some students spent most of their time in the nursery, some in L&D and some in PP. The students interested in surgery spent most of the time watching c-sections, etc. It was so cool. Our instructor wanted us to also focus on educating patients which was a wonderful experience. Anyway, it ended up being great. Have fun!

Oh, your poor husband, ER. At least you know he loves you and misses you! That's definitely worth the price of snacking, eh? I'm so glad you got that job closer to home. My friends who work perdiem really like the pay and at least in our unit, always have enough opportunities to get their hours :)

Blue, that is good news indeed about cocoa--I love a hot cuppa of both tea and cocoa, but cocoa is my favorite. Of course, anything made with chocolate is a friend of mine, LOL.

Muffie, you just crack me up. I can picture you with a celery stick in one hand and and a carrot in the other. I like my veggies just a tad steamed so my teeth don’t wiggle when I eat them.

Zoe, I love the WW cookbooks. You know they’re accurate in their nutrition counts for foods. Have you tried any of their recipes?

DS is “helping” us with that – we bought the Skinny Cow ice cream sandwiches for dessert and we each had one, and we discovered yesterday that they’re all gone

Angie - I am the same way - I once broke a square piece out of a front tooth so I am very careful - they are brittle like my nails! I've had two teeth removed (in the back) that were cracked way down to the root (kinda like my head) ...

As to the WW cookbooks, I've never tried them, but part of my over-eating is boredom, so I'm hoping this will help. I pd 25 cents apiece (with my s.a. discount!) ...

As to ds - well they must be good if they passed muster with him! lol

Hi guys!

Got word last evening. Our friend who went with us to Las Vegas passed away.

Bluehair, I cried for you I'm glad she got to go with you guys but it must be hard to lose a friend ...

I hit the "lost 20 lbs." mark - WooHoo!!! Joy!!! I am so excited!

... we had a crash-course (about an hour and a half) on central line flushing, blood draws, central line dressing changes, & the like . . . I PASSED!!!

Sarah that is so good but I know you have worked so hard! You deserve it!

As to the central line and etc., boy they must love you, where you are so eager to learn and excited! YAYY!

... and today I got a per diem job at the hospital I eventually want to work at. ...finally figured out my working away from home is depressing to [my husband].....he cried........wish he had said something sooner.

congrats! that's great! and... don't you love how hubbies will keep all their soft tender feelings away, safely away - and don't you love it when you get a glimpse, it must have been so sweet for you :)

blah blah cocoa more effect on b/p than tea, blah blah...

Oh man ... I don't LIKE cocoa, really, it always leaves me wanting MORE chocolate!

How's bluey, miss you and your blue hair :)

I made turkey meat loaf last night and nuked some cut up skin-on sweet taters on the side. DH said it was OK for a first attempt, but I was not completely happy with the way it turned out.

The meat loaf was too dry, so I'll have to tweak that recipe a bit.

Which brings me to my burning (no pun intended) question:

Can anyone tell me whether or not gravy is a "bad" food? How does that happen, exactly? I have chicken broth that's good on calories and practically fat-free. I add some cornstarch and voom! the calorie count and fat amount explodes into my system and causes me to gain two pounds overnight? Is that how it works??

I can't see it. I feel like cornstarch is low, chicken broth is low (at least the stuff in the box), therefore chicken gravy made from these ingredients should also be low, right?

Zoe to answer your question of days ago, lentils just require a cleansing rinse and take only 30 minutes to cook. That's what's great about them compared to other beans.

Take care everyone, sorry I haven't kept up lately, my bad. :)

Tweety, I didn't know that about lentils, otherwise I would have been eating them once a week! (does anyone know if beano works?)

I made turkey meat loaf last night and nuked some cut up skin-on sweet taters on the side. DH said it was OK for a first attempt, but I was not completely happy with the way it turned out.

The meat loaf was too dry, so I'll have to tweak that recipe a bit.

Which brings me to my burning (no pun intended) question:

Can anyone tell me whether or not gravy is a "bad" food? How does that happen, exactly? I have chicken broth that's good on calories and practically fat-free. I add some cornstarch and voom! the calorie count and fat amount explodes into my system and causes me to gain two pounds overnight? Is that how it works??

I can't see it. I feel like cornstarch is low, chicken broth is low (at least the stuff in the box), therefore chicken gravy made from these ingredients should also be low, right?

Turkey meat loaf, hmm... not sure if I could go for that, the original is so good! But you could also go 1/2 turkey 1/2 lean beef which would be better than the straight stuff.

re: Chicken broth, is it the sodium content or do you use low sodium? Maybe it is just water retention?

Okay, I gotta learn how to "quote" in my text here.

Zoe....actually he upset me, had he told me I would have changed over to a closer assignment sooner......but yes, I love the sweet side of a guy. Mine has a very tender side, and I enjoy that.

I am trying to be good, ate a salad for dinner, buying those salads in a bag with dsg. I am going to stop that and just buy the plain salad and buy dsg seperate, so I can get low cal, fat free,etc. I have grapefruit and apple slices for snaking later on.

I'm not so sure I like the idea of turkey meatloaf, maybe the half/half would be okay. I have started buying the 97% lean beef, it sure makes a dry meatloaf.

Okay, I gotta learn how to "quote" in my text here.

Zoe....actually he upset me, had he told me I would have changed over to a closer assignment sooner......but yes, I love the sweet side of a guy. Mine has a very tender side, and I enjoy that.

I am trying to be good, ate a salad for dinner, buying those salads in a bag with dsg. I am going to stop that and just buy the plain salad and buy dsg seperate, so I can get low cal, fat free,etc. I have grapefruit and apple slices for snaking later on.

I'm not so sure I like the idea of turkey meatloaf, maybe the half/half would be okay. I have started buying the 97% lean beef, it sure makes a dry meatloaf.

Maybe if you go easy on the breadcrumbs and add an extra egg? I usually put a little tomato sauce over my meatloaf and put green beans and the small whole new potatoes around it.

So that's why I was asking about gravy. I think a turkey meatloaf is definitely doable, but instead of using bread crumbs, I'll use stovetop premade and add some cranberries to it, and have a little gravy on the side. Seems a lot easier than cooking an entire breast or turkey, even though the calories are more for ground turkey as well, but still less than ground beef.

I'm rambling.

Still curious about the calories in the gravy though.

P.S. When you want to quote a post, just go to that post, and at the bottom of it, hit the "Quote" button. Hope that helps.

Yeah, it was the breast, so that's why it was so dry. Maybe I should baste it with the chicken broth? Orange juice? Hmmmm....

Such a good thing that I love to cook. I'm enjoying experimenting with the low-fat stuff. There's really a lot of potential there.

I'll let you know how it turns out next time we try it. Today we're having the real thing--roast turkey breast.

Oh, and Happy Mother's Day to all of you moms out there!