Eating fried food and the link to heart disease- BMJ study

A study in the BMJ reports a link between eating fried food and an increase in heart disease. What do our experts say?

"While this is an interesting study, we need to be careful in drawing firm conclusions. Being an observational study, there are potentially a number of factors that could influence the results.

While the authors have considered a number of these, there are possibly others that haven’t been taken into account.

Also, the diet was assessed at the beginning of the study which assumes the same diet was followed for the whole 18 years of follow up. No one single food alone increases the risk of heart disease, it’s important to consider the whole diet and lifestyle.

Interestingly in this study the women who ate the most fried foods also had the unhealthiest diets overall, were more likely to be smokers, were less active, as well as more likely to have diabetes. All of these factors could have contributed to the results.

As the authors concluded, adopting a healthy lifestyle, which includes cooking choices, is important to maintain a healthy heart.

This includes a diet that is low in saturated fat, based on starchy whole grains, with plenty of fruit and vegetables and which includes heart healthy foods such as nuts, seeds, oily fish, oats, pulses, vegetable proteins (such as soya, quorn and pulses), lean meat, vegetable oils and vegetable spreads."

Lynne Garton, Dietetic Advisor to HEART UK

24 January 2019