Patricia J. Karnes-Amzibel is an osteopathic physician who was born in Dover, Delaware. She received a degree in Biology from Washington College. Attended Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, where she developed an understanding of the mind, body and spirit continuum that provides health to the entire person. She developed questioning and listening skills to determine disease and communication skills to encourage health and recovery. With these skills, she continued her training at the Community Hospital of Lancaster for a year long osteopathic rotating internship. She completed her training in Family Medicine in Wilmington, Delaware at the St. Francis Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program.

Professionally, she has been a practicing physician for 24 years. She is very dedicated to the art and science of medicine. She has worked 21 years in a medically underserved community where she grew up and was a patient as a child. She knows that care is expensive and that quality medical care requires time, a trusted relationship between physician and patient and a balance to maintain this quality of care.

She realized the impact of life balance with a short exchange during a grocery shopping trip, where a patient saw Dr. Karnes-Amzibel and her husband and asked her husband, “Do you know how long I have to wait for your wife to see me?” her husband promptly responded, “Do you know how long we wait for her at night to complete all pertinent items of your visit?” That exchange brought a lot of things into perspective. She knew things needed to change to improve her ability to be present for her family and to be able to continue to provide quality time and exceptional care.

Direct Primary Care was the solution. She realized that she is a physician who believes that all interactions are purposeful. The premise of Direct Primary Care is that she gets to perform full spectrum primary care to decrease the necessity of referrals, offering reduced cost labs, radiology services and discounted medications, all saving patients time and money; yet, giving her the ability to be present for both family and patients. She would be able to practice medicine the way it should be where the patient becomes the most utilized resource of the healthcare team, which in today’s system is easily overlooked. She took an oath; the osteopathic oath for which she believes in, where the philosophy is to assist each person under their care toward a high level of wellness by focusing on health promotion and disease prevention.

Dr. Karnes-Amzibel has been married for 24 years to her husband Ed. They have three children, Anthony a young adult and two teens Aydan and Abigayle. They believe in family and community. They attend Calvary Dover where Dr. Karnes-Amzibel and her family have been volunteers for the Family Life Ministry, Old Dover Days, Family Fun Night, Vacation Bible School, Single Mom’s Day Out as well as other volunteer endeavors for Calvary Christian Academy and the Home Owners Association where they live. The Karnes-Amzibel family are working with a local organization to begin a medical mission fund that will assist those medical needs not covered by insurances. This will be funded with 10% of all income made by Alpha Omega DPC and will be going back into the community for things such as healthy eating programs geared toward families, YouTube information about chronic disease, information on addiction, building ramps to help shut in persons get out of their homes and many other ideas.

She loves making memories with her family. She loves to travel and learn about new places, history, customs, new cuisines and meeting new people. She is a renaissance woman to whom she credits her mom and dad. She can do many small fixes around the house, lay basement flooring with her husband (she calls these times marriage builders) she can change the oil in her car and change a tire (requirements before she learned to drive), she can parallel park without assistance of technology (thanks to dad and the many hours she spent in the driveway with 2 saw horses). She prefers to drive a vehicle with a standard transmission. She was the first person to graduate from college in her family (working three jobs and taking a full course load). She has tenacity to find an answer even when one is not evident through reading and prayer. She can improvise a situation like MacGyver (making a heat proof handle for a crock pot top with a Wawa coffee lid during Family Fun Night when the cheese had to be warm for nachos). She cans fruits, vegetables and makes pickles, apple sauce and has even made corn cob jelly. She prefers mom and pop stores to larger chain stores (thanks Felton Hardware and Mule Run). She prepares several meals in advance so that her family can have meals together (fix and freeze meals are healthy alternatives to store bought and you control what is in them). She can bake over 30 types of Italian cookies (she’s not Italian, but her adoptive grandparents Mom Mom and Pop Pop LePore were). She can make simple curtains (just a few straight stiches and done). She taught herself to quilt while living in Lancaster. She loves the feeling of stepping back in time with her medical bag performing house calls (like Marcus Welby and Doc Baker on Little House on the Prairie). She loves to sing and once sang a solo on the steps of the Capitol Building with her middle school choir and at Kings Dominion Amusement Park. She can type over 120 words a minute with less than 5 errors (placed third in the state of Maryland in high school). She has been the Maryland Business Woman of the Year (very honored). And last but not least, she can use a zero-turn lawnmower remarkedly well (even though her husband begs to differ).