Philly teen, shot in the head a year ago, returns to St. Chris to thank the doctors and nurses who helped him beat the odds

A year ago Tuesday, Ivan Cuevas wasn’t expected to survive.

The Mayfair high schooler, then 16, had been shot in the back of the head, running from a gunman who opened fire on a group of students outside Lincoln High School. Rushed to St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children, he scored the lowest possible rating on a standard coma assessment scale.

But as doctors threaded a breathing tube down his throat, he gasped — a sign that he still had some activity in his brain stem, pediatric neurosurgeon Tina Loven realized. Despite Ivan’s slim chances, Loven and her colleagues decided to operate.

On Tuesday, the patient she took a chance on walked into St. Christopher’s and enveloped her in a bear hug. Ivan, now 17, has defied the odds. After a month in the hospital and another in rehab, he’s walking, speaking, back at school, playing basketball, and working a part-time job at McDonald’s. On the one-year anniversary of his shooting, he wanted to thank the doctors and nurses who saved his life.

“To be talking to you right now is a blessing,” he told reporters later. He and his mother, Natali Rosario, and her fiancée, Rhiannon Hope, were all on hand Tuesday with gifts and hugs for the medical staff they’d come to know over Ivan’s monthlong stay in the hospital. (Ivan picked out a Snoopy mug for Loven, a Peanuts fan.)

Ivan doesn’t remember much of his first few weeks in the hospital. But Rosario and Hope both recall the moment they saw him move a toe, and later, blink an eye and give a thumbs-up. They remember the first time Loven greeted them with a smile — a sign that, finally, she had good news.

Never in her career has his neurosurgeon seen a recovery like his from brain injuries so extensive.

“It really speaks to his determination to live — and not just live, but come here walking, talking,” Loven said. ”If you didn’t know this happened to him, you would have no idea.”

Ivan and his family say they want his story to encourage other survivors to keep fighting, and young people caught in cycles of violence to put their guns down, as Philadelphia faces an unprecedented gun violence crisis.

“You see all the deaths on the news, and that’s not changing people,” Hope said. “Maybe more of a positive outlook will make kids realize that there is life to live ― that it can be a good one.”

Hope and Rosario said the family has coped since the shooting with humor and positivity. They still live in the neighborhood where the shooting took place, and while Ivan briefly considered attending another high school this year, he ultimately decided to go back to Lincoln to complete his senior year with his friends. Later this week, he’ll take his senior photos.

He’s not sure what he wants to do after graduation. St. Christopher’s CEO Don Miller slipped him a card during his visit. “We have 285 jobs open,” he said.

Though Ivan and his family have been back to St. Christopher’s for regular appointments since his release, they found special meaning in Tuesday’s visit exactly one year after his injury.

“It’s good to see everybody that helped me get through this whole situation,” he said.

His mother added: “And to know that our room upstairs is not ours anymore.”