Prolonged Ingestion of Dietary Cocoa Attenuates Hemoglobin Glycation Associated with Diabetes Mellitus in Rats

Cocoa contains numerous polyphenols with laudable antioxidant activity. Glycation has been implicated in the pathogenesis of complications of diabetes mellitus. We investigate the effect of coca on hemoglobin glycation in rats experimentally induced with diabetes. 21 female Sprague-Dawley rats aged 21 weeks were randomly divided into control “C” and diabetic diabetics fed cocoa “DC” and diabetics not fed cocoa “D” groups of 6, 8 and 7 rats respectively. All rats were fed rat chow; C and D groups were fed tap water while the DC group were fed 2% w/v natural cocoa powder in tap water ad libitum. Diabetes was induced by a single intravenous shot of streptozotocin (53 mg/kg body weight). Ten weeks post-diabetes, 1ml of blood aspirated from the left ventricle and stored in a plastic tube containing ethylene diamine tetraacetic acid and used to determine the glycated haemoglobin (HbA ) concentration of each rat using a DCA 2000 plasma 1c analyzer. Data was analyzed using ANOVA and posthoc Bonferroni’s Multiple Comparison Test of GraphPad Prism (3.0). Percentage hemoglobin glycation significantly reduced (p < 0.0001) reduced from 12.8±0.50 to 7.8±0.27 in D and DC groups respectively but did not attain levels observed in the controls (3.90±0.10). Cocoa powder and other cocoa products can be administered alongside current diabetes management protocols to improve patients’ outcome.