Chocolate consumption was associated with a significant lower risk of gestational diabetes in Japanese women. - GreenMedInfo Summary

The association of chocolate consumption with risk of gestational diabetes has not been examined. We aimed to investigate the prospective association between chocolate consumption and risk of gestational diabetes in a large birth cohort in Japan. A total of 97,454 pregnant women with a median gestational age of 12 weeks were recruited from January 2011 to March 2014. Data on demographic information, disease history, socioeconomic status, lifestyle, and dietary habits were obtained at the study enrollment. Dietary intakes during the past 12 months before study enrollment were assessed through a semi-quantitative food frequency questionnaire. The logistic regression was used to obtain the odds ratio of gestational diabetes in relation to chocolate consumption. Among 84,948 women eligible for the analysis, 1904 cases of gestational diabetes (2.2%) were identified during the period of pregnancy. After control for potential confounding factors including age, smoking status, drinking status, education level, occupation, pre-pregnant body mass index, depression, previous history of macrosomia babies, parity, physical activity, and dietary factors, women in the highest quartile of chocolate consumption, compared with those in the lowest quartile, had a significantly lower risk of developing gestational diabetes (odds ratio½ 0.78, 95% confidence interval: 0.67-0.90; P for trend ½ 0.002). Stratified analyses suggested that the association was not significantly modified by pre-pregnancy body mass index, age, parity, smoking status, or drinking status. The present prospective cohort study provided evidence that chocolate consumption was associated with a significant lower risk of gestational diabetes in Japanese women.