Robert Afra, MD is an orthopaedic surgeon with fellowship training in sports medicine and microsurgery.

He joined AOSM in 2011 after serving as Chief of Sports Medicine in the UCSD Department of Orthopaedic Surgery.  He has conducted research and presented on an international and national platform on cartilage issues and pain in patellofemoral (knee cap) disorders.  In fact, he is Co-Director of the International Patellofemoral Study Group Conference in San Diego in July 2011.  In addition he has conducted extensive research in minimizing pain in patients undergoing knee and shoulder surgery.  He has written many book chapters on shoulder, knee, and ankle injuries in the young and mature athlete. 

Dr Afra completed his fellowship training in sports medicine at Boston University where he treated athletes from men's ice hockey as well as other sports such as soccer, basketball, field hockey and lacrosse. Many of the Boston University men's hockey players go on to play in the NHL.

Prior to his fellowship, Dr Afra conducted research at University of Hawaii's Queen Emme Medical Center in muscle and nerve physiology. He spent time as a surgical fellow at the world-renowned Barnard O'Brien Microsurgical Institute in Melbourne, Australia. While in Australia he learned microsurgical techniques and the art of plastic surgery.

He studied medicine at UCLA where he also did his surgery internship. Prior to medical school he worked at the Salk Institute on an NIH research stipend.

In 2010 he was selected by the Arthroscopy Association of North American, a premiere sports medicine society, as one of three surgeons to lecture to university faculty in the United States and Canada over the course of one month.