Dr. Amato Giaccia

Dr. Amato Giaccia, Family Practice Physician, who made house- calls until he turned 80, dies at 98. A gardener, classical literature expert and opera buff, he was a family practice physician who died of the coronavirus while recovering from a broken hip. Dr. Amato Giaccia never tired of treating sick people. A family practice physician in Reading, PA for 40 years, he never hesitated to treat patients at any hour of the day or night. He loved to use his hands in building objects and cultivating plants. It gave him great satisfaction to look at what he created. He also was an avid classical scholar, reading and often reciting classical literature in Latin and Greek, as well as his beloved Divine Comedy by Dante. He never relinquished his rural roots, keeping a property on Pricetown Road, outside of Reading so that he could tend his beloved garden. Dr. Giaccia passed away on Friday, May 22 in Fair Oaks, Virginia. He was 98. The cause was complications from coronavirus acquired while recovering from a broken hip. He contracted the virus in a short-term rehabilitation facility and was not able to overcome its devastating effects. Born in the small but picturesque mountain village of San Felice Del Molise, Italy in 1922, he was educated in a regional academy until the advent of World War II, during the latter part of which he served in the Italian army, receiving his honorable discharge after the Allied occupation. Eventually he studied medicine at the University of Rome. His uncle who lived in Reading, PA at the time convinced him to move to the United States, and he ultimately fell in love with Reading resident, Diana Correnti. They married on Thanksgiving Day in 1958 and celebrated 50 years together without spending a night apart. During the years, he treated many residents of the Schuylkill Avenue and Buttonwood Street neighborhoods, along with many others who appreciated his skill, his empathy, his dual language ability and his willingness to make house calls anywhere and at any time. He enjoyed admission privileges at Community General Hospital in Reading and then at St Joseph’s Hospital. He worked very long hours, and was committed to the well-being of all his patients and their happiness. He set a very high standard that inspired his colleagues to be better physicians. strongly motivated by the opportunities he found in his new life and obsessed with making up for lost time. He made sure that his sons, one a cancer scientist and the other an attorney, received excellent educations and instilled his work ethic in them. To his sons Amato and Andrew, he always seemed larger than life even in his old age; to Jeanne and Lucille, he was an engaging father-in-law; to his grandchildren, AJ, Nic, Olivia, James and Henry, he was a loving and caring grandfather, and to his wife Diana, who passed away in 2008, he was a devoted and loving husband. His legacy lives on in each one of us.