Maintaining the normal composition of the gut microbiota

Dr Paul Moayyedi is a professor in the Division of Gastroenterology at McMaster University, Richard Hunt/AstraZeneca Chair in Gastroenterology, and the inaugural assistant dean of research.

How to maintain the normal composition of the gut microbiota?

Paul Moayyedi, BSc, MB ChB, PhD, MPH: As we do not know what “normal” is, it is hard to give advice on how to maintain that health.

I think the key message is to have a healthy varied diet. We are what we eat, so probably the most important thing for a normal person to maintain a healthy flora is to eat well, healthily, which is just sensible advice that we have always given. Lots of fresh fruit, vegetables, some meat is fine but a predominantly steak-and-potato diet is probably not good for your health or your microbiome, at least not in everyone. Stick to a healthy Mediterranean diet and you probably cannot go wrong.