Martin Roberts shares emotional health update as he refuses to slow down despite warnings from doctors – after horror hospital dash that left him with ‘three hours to live’

Martin Roberts has revealed he fears how long he has to live as he battles the lingering effects of a heart condition.

The Homes Under the Hammer presenter, 61, previously told how he was then hours away from death suffered from pericardial effusion and was rushed into surgery which saved his life.

Pericardial effusion is a buildup of fluid in the structure surrounding the heart, which can compress the organ and cause a life-threatening medical emergency.

Speaking exclusively to MailOnline, Martin revealed he still gets stitches in his chest which causes him to panic, but he has refused to slow down despite warnings from doctors.

He explained that he “don’t know how long he has left” and that he is trying to do as much good in the world as he can.

Martin told MailOnline: ‘The physical side of things took a lot longer than we thought. I still get stitches and every time I get a stitch in my chest I panic. As anyone who has had any form of heart problem can testify.”

Martin continued: ‘It makes you worry, because these stories only trickle out afterwards, so to speak.

‘It was as if I went to the consultant who performed the emergency operation and said to him, “How long would I have survived?”

“He said, ‘Well, you probably wouldn’t have survived the night. So it was a good thing I was on duty… you probably had two or three hours to live.”

“That was two or three hours after I died and wasn’t here anymore and didn’t see the kids and didn’t fulfill all my ambitions and didn’t do all the things I wanted to do.

“So that’s kind of the psychological side of that. It takes a lot longer to get over than the physical side.

“I was told to slow down and take it easy and things like that, and I’ve taken a completely different path.

‘This is why I have this project in Wales, where I am renovating a pub for the community, and we use local children to do the work and bring children who are disengaged and disadvantaged, giving them a chance to develop construction skills .

‘Just do a lot of good. I don’t know how much time I have left, so I just want to do as much as I can to help.

‘It’s not really about money. It’s about just making a difference because that’s what you’ll be remembered for.”

The presenter underwent the life-saving operation in 2022 after mistaking chest pain for long Covid.

Symptoms of pericardial effusion may include shortness of breath, chest pain, discomfort breathing, light-headedness, or swelling in the abdomen or legs.

Although the condition can be treated with medications, in severe cases doctors may perform surgery to drain the excess fluid.

Martin previously described his terrifying hospital ordeal on This Morning, telling Phillip Schofield and Rochelle Humes: ‘I’ve been feeling a bit under the weather for a few weeks.

‘I’ve had a few chest infections over the years and I’ve had asthma since childhood, so I’m used to quite a tight chest.

‘As the Easter holiday weekend approached, things started to get really bad, leaving me barely able to walk without gasping for breath.’

He added: ‘The confusing thing about this, it’s a bit of a red herring, is that it gets you into the breathing side of things so you don’t think it has anything to do with your heart.

“You think, ‘It must have something to do with my chest.’ Then it is dangerous to play Google doctor.

‘It looked like it could have been the symptoms of a long Covid-19 period – real lethargy, tightness in the chest, chest pain, difficulty breathing, so you pause and pause and by the time it just after the holiday is Last weekend I started to get delirious and put the letters in the wrong place. I said to Kirsty, ‘We have to go to the hospital.’

His wife Kirsty added: “Really worrying. We are grateful that we ended up in the Emergency Department.’

Martin explained that he needed surgery because the fluid buildup had put so much strain on his heart, causing organ failure.

He told Phillip and Rochelle: ‘There’s a sac around your heart and it fills with fluid, it’s called a pericardial effusion and that’s something called tapenade, which basically means this sac squeezes the heart where it around it, so the heart can’t expand and therefore can’t pump, so it means all your organs are going to fail.

“By the time they got to me, my kidneys were at 30 percent, my liver was at 30 percent, my lungs were not getting oxygen and at any time I could have had a heart attack…. The heart would have strangled itself.’

He added: ‘We are talking about minutes and hours of life here.’

When asked what was going through his mind, Martin said: ‘You’re just putting your life in the hands of professionals. I’m in the specialized cardiac drainage unit there. There is a special operating room and local anesthesia.

“I watch as they put a tube in the side of your heart and then he starts using a big syringe to draw up this dark red/black fluid, which is almost, I call death fluid, and pulls it out and squirts it into a syringe. plastic cup, pulls out another one and squirts it in and I just watched….”

Phillip asked Kirsty if her husband’s ordeal had caused a reset for them, and she replied: ‘Totally. We said this, didn’t we? I sent Martin a card when he came out of hospital and said, ‘We have to see this as a turning point.’

In an effort to improve his health, Martin has signed up for E4 series The Big Celebrity Detox, in which stars try therapies including drinking their own urine.

In the debut episode, Martin admitted he felt “shocked to his core” by his health fears.

Introducing himself during the grueling 2023 show, which came with a warning to viewers not to attempt the tasks at home, Martin reflected on his ‘terrifyingly terrible year’.

He said: ‘This year has been a terrifyingly terrible year for me. A few months ago I had a near-death experience that shook me to my core.

‘I really want this to make a difference, do I think it will? The jury is out.’

Throughout the first episode, Martin took part in a series of extreme tasks, including drinking his own urine and digesting seeds that induce vomiting.

But Martin was not convinced by the implications of the challenges and made his feelings known to spiritual expert Sah D’Simone.

When told that the first task would involve drinking his own urine, Martin remained skeptical.

He said, “How can something that gets rid of your body as a waste product be good for you?”

Despite his concerns, Martin took part in the challenge alongside his co-stars, including Kerry Katona, Megan Barton-Hanson and Princess Olga Romanoff.