Dr. John McElligott (MHS Class of 1963) was recently presented the Healthcare Hero Lifetime Achievement Award for East Tennessee. Congratulations Dr. McElligott for a well deserved honor! Below, please see the article as written in the Knoxville News Sentinel.
Dr. John McElligott has dedicated his career to better the health of East Tennesseans.
He’s co-founded multiple health care companies, including Summit Medical Group and Knoxville-based Occupational Health Systems. Occupational Health Systems provides care for workers injured on the job, employs 20 people and has a second location in Clinton.
He’s helped those dealing with opioid addiction and started a nonprofit to help truckers receive care for medical conditions.
He’s the 2022 recipient of the Health Care Heroes Lifetime Achievement Award.
But his path to becoming the esteemed “Dr. John” wasn’t a typical one.
Aa a High School All-American swimmer (with a mean butterfly stroke) in Midland, Texas, McElligott wanted to swim in college. However, his grades prevented him from getting into colleges that were offering him scholarships.
He ended up going to Odessa Junior College, in Texas and then Old Dominion University in Virginia.
He joined the U.S. Navy at 18, becoming a combat medic in the Vietnam War. He said he chose the Navy to keep from getting drafted by the Army, as he didn’t like the green uniforms.
He would end up getting transferred to the Marine Corps before being deployed.
“Having been a Corpsman and then getting transferred to the Marine Corps was probably the biggest thing,” he said when asked about lessons he learned from his time as a combat medic. “It gave me the ability to think on my feetand to handle really difficult situations.”
After the military, McElligott graduated from the Duke University Physician’s Assistant program in 1974 and spent 15 years practicing as a physician assistant in East Tennessee.
Wanting to further his career in medicine, he received his Medical Certification in 1989 after attending the Spartan Health Sciences University School of Medicine in El Paso, Texas, and completing his three-year residency at the Yale School of Medicine Griffin Hospital. Being in his late 30s, he was the oldest in his class.
“I was number one in my graduating class,” he smiled.
Now, he has his medical license not just in Tennessee, but six other states, from Connecticut to New Mexico.
But “Dr. John” almost hung up his stethoscope a few years ago. Fay Swanson, McElligott’s executive assistant, said he almost retired after leaving another practice.
However, McElligott’s passion for helping others trumped the thought of retirement. So in 1998, he founded Occupational Health Systems.
“He thought about it and he knew that, with his passion for people and medicine, he could not just sit on that gift,” Swanson said.
At 77, McElligott’s passion for medicine hasn’t faded.
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