Daniel Ivankovich
Encyclopedia
Daniel Anthony Ivankovich MD
is an orthopedic
surgeon
and blues
musician/producer from Chicago
, Illinois
, who specializes in traumatology, joint replacement and spinal disorders. He is known for his humanitarian efforts on behalf of the under-served in Chicago's inner city via The Bone Squad and is medical director of OnePatient-Global Health Initiative, based out of Chicago, Illinois.
, Croatia
, on November 23, 1963, he has lived in Chicago since the age of three.
Achieving All-State and All-American honors as an Illinois prep basketball player, Ivankovich was a highly recruited player. With over 500 scholarship offers, he decided to play for Northwestern University
while working towards his BSM/MD in the Honors Program In Medical Education. Unfortunately, a knee injury curtailed his sports career.
Ivankovich studied medicine at Northwestern University, where he received his degree in 1995. He completed his Orthopedic Residency Training at Rush University Medical Center
and is fellowship-trained in Adult Joint Reconstruction (Rush University Medical Center), Reconstructive Spine and Traumatology (Northwestern Memorial Hospital) and Spinal Cord Injury (Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
).
After the 2010 Haiti earthquake
, Ivankovich and his team airlifted thousands of tons of medical supplies to Port-au-Prince
. He collaborated with Team Rubicon USA to set up mobile Forward-Assist Surgical Teams (F.A.S.T.) to manage hundreds of Haitians with severe injuries. While rounding through the multiple tent-city medical camps, he and colleagues from Handicap International
discovered nearly fifty patients with severe spinal cord injuries.
Ivankovich came upon two such patients, Bazelais Suy and Josette Delisca, who managed to survive despite life-threatening injuries. Ivankovich personally escorted them to Chicago with the assistance of AirMed International
and MedEvac, where they received care at Northwestern Memorial Hospital
and the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
.
In 2010, Dr. Ivankovich organized a team of health providers from Chicago to join him in his mission and features their biographies at his website, The Bone Squad http://www.bonesquad.com. He also blogs in the voice of his alter ego, the Reverend Doctor D, focusing on health & social challenges and chronicling his work in Haiti.
He was featured on the CBS Evening News
with Katie Couric
in a segment called "The American Spirit". He travels from hospital to hospital in various configurations of the "Bone Mobile", (1) brilliant-black 2007 Dodge Magnum SRT8 street-rod, (2) black crystal-pearl 2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8, and (3) brilliant-black 2004 Dodge RAM SRT10 race pick-up. Dr. Ivankovich has worked closely with Dodge Racing/Mopar Performance, in the development of each of the street-legal, SRT race vehicles, which dyno-test at over 600 horsepower.
After his appearance on the CBS Evening News, Ivankovich was contacted by "Massive" Mike Williams
, former power forward for the Atlanta Hawks
. Williams remembered Ivankovich from their high school years in Chicago, when both were All-State & All-American basketball players. On November 29, 2009, Williams was shot and paralyzed while working at an Atlanta nightclub. Currently, Ivankovich and Williams have teamed up with Berkeley Bionics to fit Williams with eLegs, electronic prostheses. The story was featured on the Today Show's American Story segment on 02/21/2011.
Ivankovich has been a producer and on-air talent at WNUR-FM (Evanston, Illinois), WCKG-FM (Chicago, Illinois) and produced the Hot 97 Morning Show with Howard Hoffman and Stephanie Miller on WQHT-FM (New York) and MJI Broadcasting (New York). He also hosted "Out Of The Blue", a Chicago blues radio program that was syndicated throughout the Midwest and Southeast United States via KOST Broadcasting (Chicago, Illinois).
An article in American Blues Scene magazine, April 2011, describes his work combining music with his humanitarian endeavors.
Doctor of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine is a doctoral degree for physicians. The degree is granted by medical schools...
is an orthopedic
Orthopedics
Orthopedics is the study of the musculoskeletal system. The Greek word 'ortho' means straight or correct and 'pedics' comes from the Greek 'pais' meaning children. For many centuries, orthopedists have been involved in the treatment of crippled children...
surgeon
Surgeon
In medicine, a surgeon is a specialist in surgery. Surgery is a broad category of invasive medical treatment that involves the cutting of a body, whether human or animal, for a specific reason such as the removal of diseased tissue or to repair a tear or breakage...
and blues
Blues
Blues is the name given to both a musical form and a music genre that originated in African-American communities of primarily the "Deep South" of the United States at the end of the 19th century from spirituals, work songs, field hollers, shouts and chants, and rhymed simple narrative ballads...
musician/producer from Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
, Illinois
Illinois
Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...
, who specializes in traumatology, joint replacement and spinal disorders. He is known for his humanitarian efforts on behalf of the under-served in Chicago's inner city via The Bone Squad and is medical director of OnePatient-Global Health Initiative, based out of Chicago, Illinois.
Early history
Born in ZagrebZagreb
Zagreb is the capital and the largest city of the Republic of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb lies at an elevation of approximately above sea level. According to the last official census, Zagreb's city...
, Croatia
Croatia
Croatia , officially the Republic of Croatia , is a unitary democratic parliamentary republic in Europe at the crossroads of the Mitteleuropa, the Balkans, and the Mediterranean. Its capital and largest city is Zagreb. The country is divided into 20 counties and the city of Zagreb. Croatia covers ...
, on November 23, 1963, he has lived in Chicago since the age of three.
Achieving All-State and All-American honors as an Illinois prep basketball player, Ivankovich was a highly recruited player. With over 500 scholarship offers, he decided to play for Northwestern University
Northwestern University
Northwestern University is a private research university in Evanston and Chicago, Illinois, USA. Northwestern has eleven undergraduate, graduate, and professional schools offering 124 undergraduate degrees and 145 graduate and professional degrees....
while working towards his BSM/MD in the Honors Program In Medical Education. Unfortunately, a knee injury curtailed his sports career.
Ivankovich studied medicine at Northwestern University, where he received his degree in 1995. He completed his Orthopedic Residency Training at Rush University Medical Center
Rush University Medical Center
Rush University Medical Center is a 676-bed academic medical center that includes hospital facilities for adults and children. It also includes the Johnston R. Bowman Health Center...
and is fellowship-trained in Adult Joint Reconstruction (Rush University Medical Center), Reconstructive Spine and Traumatology (Northwestern Memorial Hospital) and Spinal Cord Injury (Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago , ranked the "#1 Rehabilitation in America" by U.S. News & World Report every year since 1991 is a rehabilitation hospital located in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It also operates a network of alliance hospitals and outpatient and day rehabilitation...
).
Family
Daniel's father, Anthony D. Ivankovich MD, an internationally recognized pioneer in cardiac anesthesiology, is Chairman Emeritus of the Department or Anesthesia at RUSH University Medical Center in Chicago, Illinois; while his mother, Olga Ivankovich MD, specializes in Primary Care Medicine and directs the RUSH University Pain Clinic.Medical work
In 2000, Ivankovich established The Chicago Musculoskeletal Initiative (ChiMSI) in 2000 in an effort to improve access to health care in many medically under-served communities and hospitals in the Chicago area. Since then, ChiMSI has grown from a one surgeon, fifteen-patient initiative into a multi-disciplinary group of orthopedic surgeons, podiatrists, physiatrists, internists and pain medicine specialists, providing routine and emergency care to a broad range of patients and communities. ChiMSI served over 7,000 patients in 2005, expanding to 15,000 patients/clinic visits and over 800 surgical cases in 2009.After the 2010 Haiti earthquake
2010 Haiti earthquake
The 2010 Haiti earthquake was a catastrophic magnitude 7.0 Mw earthquake, with an epicentre near the town of Léogâne, approximately west of Port-au-Prince, Haiti's capital. The earthquake occurred at 16:53 local time on Tuesday, 12 January 2010.By 24 January, at least 52 aftershocks...
, Ivankovich and his team airlifted thousands of tons of medical supplies to Port-au-Prince
Port-au-Prince
Port-au-Prince is the capital and largest city of the Caribbean nation of Haiti. The city's population was 704,776 as of the 2003 census, and was officially estimated to have reached 897,859 in 2009....
. He collaborated with Team Rubicon USA to set up mobile Forward-Assist Surgical Teams (F.A.S.T.) to manage hundreds of Haitians with severe injuries. While rounding through the multiple tent-city medical camps, he and colleagues from Handicap International
Handicap International
Handicap International is a non-governmental organization created in 1982 to provide help in refugee camps in Cambodia and Thailand. Based in Belgium and France, it has since opened branches in six other countries : Switzerland, Luxembourg, United Kingdom, Germany, Canada and the United States...
discovered nearly fifty patients with severe spinal cord injuries.
Ivankovich came upon two such patients, Bazelais Suy and Josette Delisca, who managed to survive despite life-threatening injuries. Ivankovich personally escorted them to Chicago with the assistance of AirMed International
AirMed International
AirMed International, LLC, based in Birmingham, Alabama, is a fee for service air ambulance airline. The company was founded in 1987 as MEDjet International and renamed AirMed International in 2003. AirMed offers international service to all countries except for Iraq, North Korea, and Libya...
and MedEvac, where they received care at Northwestern Memorial Hospital
Northwestern Memorial Hospital
Northwestern Memorial Hospital is one of the nation's preeminent academic medical centers and is the primary teaching hospital for Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine. It is the second tallest hospital in the United States and the fourth tallest hospital in the world...
and the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago
The Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago , ranked the "#1 Rehabilitation in America" by U.S. News & World Report every year since 1991 is a rehabilitation hospital located in Chicago, Illinois, United States. It also operates a network of alliance hospitals and outpatient and day rehabilitation...
.
In 2010, Dr. Ivankovich organized a team of health providers from Chicago to join him in his mission and features their biographies at his website, The Bone Squad http://www.bonesquad.com. He also blogs in the voice of his alter ego, the Reverend Doctor D, focusing on health & social challenges and chronicling his work in Haiti.
He was featured on the CBS Evening News
CBS Evening News
CBS Evening News is the flagship nightly television news program of the American television network CBS. The network has broadcast this program since 1948, and has used the CBS Evening News title since 1963....
with Katie Couric
Katie Couric
Katherine Anne "Katie" Couric is an American journalist and author. She serves as Special Correspondent for ABC News, contributing to ABC World News, Nightline, 20/20, Good Morning America, This Week and primetime news specials...
in a segment called "The American Spirit". He travels from hospital to hospital in various configurations of the "Bone Mobile", (1) brilliant-black 2007 Dodge Magnum SRT8 street-rod, (2) black crystal-pearl 2008 Jeep Grand Cherokee SRT8, and (3) brilliant-black 2004 Dodge RAM SRT10 race pick-up. Dr. Ivankovich has worked closely with Dodge Racing/Mopar Performance, in the development of each of the street-legal, SRT race vehicles, which dyno-test at over 600 horsepower.
After his appearance on the CBS Evening News, Ivankovich was contacted by "Massive" Mike Williams
Mike Williams
Mike Williams may refer to:* Mike Williams , former President of the New Zealand Labour Party* Mike Williams, a deputy of Wild Bill Hickock who was accidentally shot and killed by Wild Bill* Mike Williams, current President and CEO of Fannie Mae...
, former power forward for the Atlanta Hawks
Atlanta Hawks
The Atlanta Hawks are an American professional basketball team based in Atlanta, Georgia. They are part of the Southeast Division of the Eastern Conference in the National Basketball Association .-The first years:...
. Williams remembered Ivankovich from their high school years in Chicago, when both were All-State & All-American basketball players. On November 29, 2009, Williams was shot and paralyzed while working at an Atlanta nightclub. Currently, Ivankovich and Williams have teamed up with Berkeley Bionics to fit Williams with eLegs, electronic prostheses. The story was featured on the Today Show's American Story segment on 02/21/2011.
Musical career
Daniel Ivankovich is a founding member, vocalist and guitarist for the Chicago Blues All-Stars. As ReverendDoctorD, he has played alongside such Chicago blues legends as Eddie Taylor, Homesick James, Hubert Sumlin, James Cotton, Magic Slim, Junior Wells, and Bo Diddley, to name a few, including a stint as bandleader for bluesman, Otis Rush.Ivankovich has been a producer and on-air talent at WNUR-FM (Evanston, Illinois), WCKG-FM (Chicago, Illinois) and produced the Hot 97 Morning Show with Howard Hoffman and Stephanie Miller on WQHT-FM (New York) and MJI Broadcasting (New York). He also hosted "Out Of The Blue", a Chicago blues radio program that was syndicated throughout the Midwest and Southeast United States via KOST Broadcasting (Chicago, Illinois).
An article in American Blues Scene magazine, April 2011, describes his work combining music with his humanitarian endeavors.