Matthew Abel, M.D.

Matthew Abel: My name is Matthew Abel. I am originally from Southeast Ohio. I went to college  in Wheeling, West Virginia, and did my medical school at West Virginia University. I have two amazing kids, an eight year old son and a four year old daughter, and I’m married to a beautiful woman named Sarah. I have been with  Ephraim for three weeks now. 

There’s not a lot of spare time these days with kids doing NTI and their ages, but  I do like to work out, read, do anything active. 

It started when I was very, very young. I was always one of the smarter kids in my class, and everybody’s like, “You should be a doctor.” And I didn’t quite take  it seriously, it was just something that everybody says I should do this, I do it.  

And eventually I found that I liked science. I liked healthcare. And the more and  more I learned about the more and more that’s what I wanted to do. 

I actually was a teacher before I became a doctor. In college, I chickened out  

about going the pre-med route, and taught for a little while, and coached track  and cross country. And then eventually decided that I shouldn’t have chickened  out before, and went back and got my degree. 

I did my undergraduate schooling at Wheeling Jesuit University in Wheeling,  

West Virginia. I did my medical education and residency for family medicine, both at West Virginia University in Morgantown. 

As I was going through medical school, I kept an open mind about what I thought I was going to do. I know that everybody changes their mind. When I first started, I thought I wanted to be an orthopedic surgeon, and quickly found  out that they work really hard. And not that I’m afraid of hard work, but as I was  going through school, I found my first rotation of third year was obstetrics and gynecology. I loved it. Second rotation was pediatrics. I loved it. Third rotation was surgery. Didn’t love the hours, but I loved the procedures. And then I did internal medicine, loved it. Did family medicine and loved it. And found that family medicine was going to allow me to do all of those things, but also develop  relationships with my patients, so no two days are the same. I get to learn and keep learning, and those are all really important things to me, so that’s why I chose family medicine. 

My patients should expect me to care about all of their health. If you come with  an acute complaint, sure, we’re going to address it, but I’m going to try to address things that are important for your long term health, your cholesterol, your cancer screenings, your diet, your exercise. All of those things are important and can prevent future illness. You can also expect me to joke around  with you, get to know your family. I think all those things are important when you are treating someone. You can develop more tailored regimens if you know  someone and how they’re going to react. 

I would like to think my practice is a more family oriented environment. We have  a small clinic. There are only five people with three staff and two providers. We  know each other very well. We want to get to know all of our patients very well.  

Additionally, I’d like to think that it’s all inclusive. I want to take care of everything; mental health, physical health. Any problems that you might have, I  think it’s important for a family doctor to know about. 

The most rewarding part of my job is getting to know patients and getting them  to trust that I’m doing what’s best for their health long-term. And when you see  them turn a corner on a problem that they’ve had for ten, 15 years, or they take  responsibility for their cholesterol, or their blood sugar, and they get it and they  improve it. Those types of things are really important. 

Matthew Abel: I would say Pepsi. That actually alters from week to week. I’m one of those  people that I’m like, I’m craving a Pepsi this week, or I’ll crave a Coke next week.  But I find that I choose Pepsi more often than not. 

Coffee, for sure. I hated both of them for probably 28 years of my life, and then  medical school and residency happened. 

Puppies, for sure. I am definitely a dog person, my family and I have two dogs.  

One is the best dog we’ve ever had. The other one, we’ll keep. We love them though. We’ve always been dog people. My wife is allergic to cats, so they are a  no, no in our house. 

That depends on the situation. Ten years ago, if you’d asked me that question, I  would’ve said phone call, 100 percent0. Now, I talk all day, so if I can send something in a text and not have to talk a little bit further, I would rather do that. Sometimes text doesn’t lend itself to what you need to say. And I am notorious about sending a text that is misinterpreted. So I’m going to say text, with the caveat that sometimes a phone call’s necessary. 

I am a former long distance runner. I ran track and cross country in college and high school. And for five, ten years after that, I ran exclusively for exercise. My body has since revolted and I still like to run, I have a treadmill, but I do weights  four times a week. So I’m going to have to say, weights. And all of my former teammates are now going to groan and roll their eyes at me whenever they see this. 

Pancakes. And I don’t really have an explanation for that one. They are essentially the same thing. 

Android. And again, I don’t really have an explanation for that one. I think it’s just that something that was the first smartphone that my wife and I got and we’ve just stayed on team Android ever since. 

That’s a good one. I’m going to go with cake, just because it has that whole birthday feel to it. 

Doing the dishes. I don’t really mind doing the laundry. You can put it in, walk away. I don’t like folding. But the dishes, I have two small children and there’s always some sort of half eaten food in the dishes. And that is just disgusting, and  I don’t do well with it. 

Another good one. I’m going to say tacos. I really like Mexican food, although you can’t really beat a good burger either. 

I have always driven a car, I’ve never driven a truck. I have nothing against them,  but again, I tend to just stick with what I’ve done for my whole life. 

Amusement park. I’m not really a thrill seeking type, but I really love roller coasters. Also, I am a very, very light complected person. And so the beach tends  to really affect me, in not so good ways. 

Popcorn, for sure. And that’s something I think, my wife kind of instilled into me.  She loves movie theater popcorn with the butter, and she loves it so much that  we always get it now it’s just a thing. 

That’s another good question. I think it depends on the situation. I find, as I get  older it’s more books, reading things on the internet than watching TV. We’ve actually just cut the cord from cable, but I can never give up TV completely, because that’s where all my sports are. 

Mountains. I come to you all from West Virginia and we were the mountaineers  for a reason. Again, same reason that I was talking about earlier with the beach,  the oceans are warm, hot, I get sunburnt, uncomfortable. The mountains have beautiful views, more temperate climates. It’s just way more my speed. 

Countryside for sure. I was born and raised in a small town of about 400. My dad  grew up on a dairy farm, in the middle of an 86 acre farm. And we now live in  

Lancaster, which is very countryside and we’re super happy. 

Summer. Even though I’ve said a couple times during this interview that I am not  a big fan of the ocean and the heat. I’m a way bigger hater of snow and ice, and  being freezing cold. 

Fan. And I don’t know when it started, but I’ve slept with a fan since I’ve been a  teenager, I guess, and I can not sleep without one. And it has nothing to do with  temperature. It’s just the ambient noise in the background. And nothing is like a  box fan. Not the sounds you can play on your phone, not the noise machines.  

The fan is where it’s at. 

When you sent this list of things that you were going to ask me today out, my wife and I laughed hysterically at this one. Why this question? I’m not real sure,  but I’m going to go with ninjas and I have no idea why.