The Donahoe Clinic

The Donahoe Clinic began in 1949 with the partnership of two longtime Sioux Falls physicians and surgeons, Drs. Stephen A. Donahoe and Geoffrey I. W. Cottam. The clinic was located on the ninth floor of the National Bank of South Dakota building at the northeast corner of 9th Street and Phillips Avenue. Post World War II focus on the development of specialties led to the addition of new partners in the early 1950s, including Drs. John W. and Robert R. Donahoe, Russell T. Orr, Edward H. Peters, and Robert E. Nelson. Early appointments were handled by a sign-in ledger and payment of two dollars for the initial visit, regardless of the medical problem. Space in the clinic was at a premium, and patients waited in the halls for appointments., Clinic growth necessitated a larger facility, which was built in 1952 at 24th Street and Minnesota Avenue. Later additions at this site more than doubled the size of the clinic and allowed the addition of several more specialty physicians, who then totaled 26., Seventeen acres of land were purchased west of Kiwanis Avenue between 34th and 37th Streets for the third site of the Donahoe Clinic. After the clinic opened in 1976 with a new name, Central Plains Clinic (CPC), the number of physician partners reached 70. Several of the physicians also served on the clinical faculty of the University of South Dakota School of Medicine when it expanded into a four-year degree-granting institution. A satellite clinic, Central Plains Clinic East, opened in 1986 at 26th Street and Sycamore Avenue to serve the city's rapidly growing southeastern side., The continued expansion of Sioux Falls into a regional medical center resulted in the construction of a new $16 million main clinic building at 21st Street and Cliff Avenue. It opened in 1992 and provided a new east edge to the expanding Avera McKennan Hospital Campus. Central Plains Clinic West was built just north of the former Kiwanis Avenue site to maintain a clinical practice presence there. By 1999 member physicians numbered over 100. In addition two clinics outside Sioux Falls, the Brown Clinic, Watertown, and Medical Arts Professional Association, Rapid City, merged with and came under the CPC umbrella., In May 2002 the purchase and merger of CPC by Sioux Valley Health System, its cross-town competitor, was completed. The Donahoe Clinic, later known as Central Plains Clinic, no longer existed.