A heart surgeon has shared the one thing he recommends avoiding in your diet in order to maintain good metabolic health – and avoid ending up on the operating table

A heart surgeon has spoken out about the one thing he recommends people eliminate from their diet to stay healthy and avoid ending up on his operating table. On average in the United States, someone dies every 33 seconds from cardiovascular disease.

In 2022, 702,880 people died from heart disease nationwide. This accounted for one in every five deaths across the US, making heart disease the leading cause of death. While factors like age and genetics significantly influence the risk of developing heart problems, lifestyle plays an undeniable role as well, and changing our eating habits can drastically increase or decrease our risk.

In a clip from British entrepreneur Steven Bartlett’s podcast, Diary of a CEO, Dr Philip Ovadia – author of the book Stay off My Operating Table – highlighted that consuming one specific type of food can increase your likelihood of falling ill.

“What I really tried to look at [while writing my book] was, what are the common things amongst all those diets that will keep people metabolically healthy or make people metabolically healthy?” he said in a clip from the podcast posted to TikTok.

“It comes down to eating whole, real food.

“Elimination of processed food, I think, is the most important step if you want to get metabolically healthy.”

Dr. Ovadia further noted that “within that framework” there are numerous ways to eat, whether that involves incorporating more meat into your meals or following a plant-based diet.

“When you really look at, what is the one commonality that we can point to that will predict the best success of being metabolically healthy, it’s eating real food,” he explained.

When asked what counted as ‘real food,’ Dr Ovadia shared the rule he recommends to patients.

“Eat the things that grow in the ground, and eat the things that eat the things that grow in the ground,” he said, advocating for a mix of plant and animal products.

Metabolic health refers to your body’s ability to break down things like fats and sugars. How your body responds to insulin is thought to be one indicator of how good your metabolic health is, Bupa UK reports.

Having poor metabolic health can make you more susceptible to cardiovascular disease and other heart conditions. It may also increase your risk of illnesses such as cancer and diabetes.

According to Bupa, having a “larger waist size, increased blood pressure, unhealthy fat (triglycerides and cholesterol) levels and raised glucose (blood sugar) level” can all put you at risk of poor metabolic health.

The American Heart Association recommends people ensure they do 150 minutes of moderate physical activity or 75 minutes of vigorous physical activity a week, ideally spreading this over the course of the week.

Try to eat as many as or fewer calories than you consume, avoid tobacco, and eat healthily.

This means incorporating a wide variety of fruits, vegetables and whole grains into your diet, eating healthy sources of lean, unprocessed protein, and limiting processed foods, added sugars, salt, and alcohol.