Anand Kumar, M.D.

About

Anand R. Kumar, M.D., FACS, FAAP, is a pediatric plastic and cranio-maxillofacial surgeon at Pediatrix Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery of Savannah. His clinical practice focuses on cleft and craniofacial surgery, including craniosynostosis, cleft lip and palate repair, correction of hypertelorism (wide eyes), pediatric and adolescent facial skeletal deformities (hemifacial microsomia, Treacher Collins, and Pierre Robin Sequence) with airway obstruction using traditional orthognathic (jaw) surgery and distraction osteogenesis and microtia reconstruction or total ear reconstruction using the patient's tissue.

Dr. Kumar has extensive experience in pediatric plastic surgery. He established the center for facial skeletal surgery at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and the center for pediatric craniofacial surgery at Rainbow Babies and Children's Hospital, emphasizing multidisciplinary care for cleft and craniodentofacial anomalies. He has led efforts to improve outcomes in pediatric sleep apnea using skeletal surgery and distraction osteogenesis for multilevel airway obstruction. In addition, he has participated in multi-institutional trials to improve clinical outcomes in neonatal tongue base collapse (Pierre Robin Sequence).

As an honor student in the biological sciences at the University of California, Irvine, Dr. Kumar received his medical degree from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He completed his general surgery residency at the Mayo Clinic Rochester and a second residency in plastic and reconstructive surgery at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). After his residency at UCLA, he completed a pediatric plastic/craniofacial surgery fellowship. In 2004, before his academic appointment, Dr. Kumar volunteered for military service and joined the United States Navy until 2010. In Bethesda, Maryland, he served as director and staff pediatric plastic surgeon of the Military Craniofacial Unit at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center. He served as division chief in plastic and reconstructive surgery at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda and on board the United States Naval Support Hospital Ship Comfort. Dr. Kumar was recruited to the University of Pittsburgh, the Johns Hopkins Hospital and Case Western University before establishing Pediatrix Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery of Savannah.

Dr. Kumar led the craniobiology/regenerative medicine research team at Johns Hopkins and Case Western Universities with a keen interest in muscle-derived progenitor cell biology. Using in vitro, organotypic and in vivo murine bone defect models, his team studied cell migration, cell survival and fate tracking and osteogenic differentiation using fluorescent protein-expressing cells, confocal cell imaging technology and hypothesis-neutral RNA-seq studies. The craniobiology research team helped unlock the osteogenic/myogenic potential of these unique cells to heal critical bone, muscle and cartilage defects of the craniofacial skeleton. His team's novel study has been recognized and supported by the Plastic Surgery Foundation, the American Society of Maxillofacial Surgeons, Rainbow Babies Circle of Friends Grant and the Johns Hopkins Military & Veterans Institute.

Dr. Kumar has authored over 80 original scientific publications in peer-reviewed journals and contributed to multiple plastic and orthopedic surgery textbooks over the last 18 years. He serves as a reviewer and section editor for many plastic surgery and basic science journals, including PRS, PRS-GO, FACE and CPCJ. He has been invited as a speaker or panelist at many institutions and organizational meetings across the United States. He currently serves as secretary on the board of the American Society of Maxillofacial Surgeons (ASMS). In addition, he serves on multiple committees in the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, the American Association of Pediatric Plastic Surgeons (AAPPS), where he is president, and the ASMS.