Don Eugene Detmer was born in Kansas in 1939. He studied at the University of Kansas and the University of Durham in Durham, England before earning his MD in June 1965 from the University of Kansas. He also received an MA from the University of Cambridge in 2002. His postgraduate medical training was done at Johns Hopkins Hospital (1965-1967) and at the Duke University Medical Center under Dr. David Sabiston, Jr. from 1969 to 1972. He spent a year from 1972-1973 at the Institute of Medicine, National Academies in Washington DC. His military service was as a clinical associate, Surgery Branch at the National Heart Institute at the National Institutes of Health from 1967-1969 and as a surgeon with the U.S. Public Health Service from 1972-1973.

Dr. Detmer served a joint appointment in preventative medicine and surgery at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he was assistant professor (1973-1977), associate professor (1977-1980), and professor (1980-1984). In 1984, he joined the University of Utah, serving as Vice President for Health Sciences and professor of surgery and medical informatics until 1988. Dr. Detmer was instrumental in developing the University of Utah's Integrated Academic/Advanced Information Systems (IAIMIS).

In 1988, he came to the University of Virginia where he was the Vice President for Health Sciences, a professor in the department of surgery, and a professor of business administration at the Darden School. From 1992-1999, Dr. Detmer was co-director of the Virginia Health Policy Center. From 1993-1996, he was Vice-President and Provost for Health Sciences at the University, as well as a professor of health policy and a professor of surgery. From 1996-1998, he was the Senior Vice President at the University, also lecturing as a professor in health policy, health sciences policy, surgery, and health evaluation sciences until 1999.

From 1999-2004, Dr. Detmer was the Dennis Gillings Professor of Health Management at Cambridge University and is a lifetime member of Clare Hall College, Cambridge. From 2005-2015, he was a visiting professor at the Centre for Health Informatics and Multi-professional Education, University College London.

Dr. Detmer's professional activities include working with the American Medical Informatics Association, the China Medical Board of New York, the Friends of the National Library of Medicine, the Institute of Medicine, the American Association of Medical Colleges, and the Nuffield Trust. He additionally served as the Chair of the Board of Regents at the National Library of Medicine, the Chair of the Board on Health Care Services at the IOM/NAM, and like Kerr White and John Ashley before him, as Chair of the National Committee on Vital and Health Statistics. His professional affiliations, memberships, honors and awards were many. He served on editorial boards; advisory groups in the US and the UK; on government boards and committees; and as a consultant to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services; the U.S. Congress; to the states of New York, Virginia, and Wisconsin; and to various universities and foundations. He is a frequent visiting lecturer, both national and internationally. His bibliography has nearly 200 entries and includes articles related to surgery, health policy, physician assistants, computer-based patient records, physician workforce, medical informatics, quality of health care, and the academic health center.

He was married to Mary Helen McFerson (1939-2018) and has two daughters. In October 2024, he married Sharon Hauff.