Supermodel Anok Yai reveals congenital defect ‘overworking’ heart and ‘destroying’ lungs

Supermodel Anok Yai has opened up about the recent discovery that she suffers from a congenital defect.

Yai, the first Black model to open a Prada runway, posted on Instagram on Friday to reveal that doctors found a birth defect that did not make itself present until recently.

Around three to four percent of babies are born with some type of birth defect, according to the Boston Children’s Hospital. It is not uncommon for symptoms of the defect to remain dormant for years or throughout a person’s entire life.

“For the past year I’ve been dealing with this silent battle,” Yai captioned the post, which showed various clips of her lying in a hospital bed. “I incidentally found out I had a congenital defect overworking my heart and slowly destroying my lungs.”

She explained in the post that she was asymptomatic throughout most of her life, but it all started to unravel after experiencing a lingering cough.

“[The cough] turned to chest pains, bouts of coughing up blood, then at times struggling to breathe,” Yai continued. “I chose to work through this while trying to find the right doctor and the right time. I quickly realized there was never going to be a ‘right time’ — my health would continue to worsen.”

“I’ve always thought I could outwork or outrun anything but the universe has a way of slowing you down and waking you up. So, yesterday I had a successful robotic lung surgery thanks to Dr. Robert Cerfolio and his gracious and talented team who I am forever indebted to for giving me more time.”

The robotic surgery the supermodel referred to is called a robotic thoracic surgery, which the American Lung Association describes as a procedure used to remove diseased lung tissue and possibly surrounding lymph nodes.

The supermodel then thanked her medical team for discovering her condition and noted that she is currently in recovery.

“I am forever grateful for Dr. Harmik Soukiasian and everyone at the @beverlyhillsconciergehealth for discovering my condition,” her caption continued. “Thank you to all the doctors and amazing nurses at @nyulangone, and thank you to my friends and family for being the first thing I saw when I woke up.”

“For now, I’m healing … but I’ll be back,” her caption concluded. “See ya.”

Since Yai’s debut on the Prada runway in 2018, her career has continued to take off, with her winning Model of the Year at the 2025 Fashion Awards earlier this month.

“I was told that I would be a flash-in-the-pan and that I would be crushed by the machine that is the fashion industry and my career would only last six months,” she said in her acceptance speech at the ceremony. “It’s been a long six months, huh?”