Dr. William Fifer, health care promoter and 'edutainer'

Dr. William Fifer of Minnetonka, a pioneering physician at what is now Park Nicollet Clinic in St. Louis Park, turned his medical skills toward research and public speaking to promote quality health care across the nation.

Fifer, who once was president of the medical staff at St. Louis Park's Methodist Hospital, died April 30 in St. Louis Park of an abdominal aortic aneurism. He was 84.

Known for his entertaining and humorous presentations, he formed Clayton Fifer Associates, teaching and consulting with health-care groups and medical associations. He ran the firm with his wife, Anne, of Shorewood. Their goal was to inspire medical and business health-care professionals to work together.

"He truly had a gift and was a natural-born teacher," said his wife. He called himself an "edutainer," never chastising his audiences, she said, adding, "he loved to make people laugh. He made the bad medicine go down with his humor."

During World War II, the Army ROTC cadet from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, was sent to Columbia University's medical school. He later served as a battalion surgeon in the Korean War.

By the mid-1950s, he completed his residency in internal medicine at the University of Minnesota, serving as a chief resident. He practiced at the former St. Louis Park Medical Center that became a part of Park Nicollet, and in 1969, he became president of Methodist Hospital's medical staff.

In the 1970s, he worked at the University of Minnesota, running a health-care education center and conducting health-policy research. For two years, he directed an eight-state group for Minneapolis' VA Medical Center that provided continuing education.

Dr. Leland Kaiser of Denver, a health-care futurist, said he was ahead of his time in stumping for quality health care. "I really considered him a guru," especially for pushing health care professionals to seek continual education, he said.

Fifer held "hospitals and physicians accountable for what they did with patients," Kaiser said.

From the time he attended grade school in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, he loved to make people laugh. His antics once prompted a teacher to send a note home, telling his parents that he could become a good student if he stopped cutting up.

When Dr. Stuart Hanson, a Park Nicollet internist, was a University of Minnesota medical student in the early 1960s, he attended Fifer's packed weekly conferences.

Fifer would direct physician-professors to bring interesting cases, with X-rays, to the discussion. Then he would put them on the spot. "All the med students loved to go to that conference," said Hanson. "He was a real showman."

In addition to his wife, he is survived by a son, William of Minnetonka; four daughters Angela Jezierski of Savage, Alison Stonecipher of Santa Barbara, Calif., Penman Louis of Savanna, Ga., and Judith Fifer of Boston; his former wife, Dr. Ellen Green of Minneapolis, and nine grandchildren.