Officials from Lebanon, N.H.-based Dartmouth-Hitchcock and Manchester, N.H.-based Elliot Health System have ceased plans to embark on a formal affiliation, according to Valley News.
In an email to employees obtained by Valley News, Dartmouth-Hitchcock President and CEO James Weinstein, DO, said both health systems jointly determined they could "best serve [their] respective missions by continuing to work collaboratively in selected areas rather than by entering into a more fully integrated relationship," according to the article.
"Despite the sustained hard work and good faith of both boards and senior management, we have together agreed to shift our focus from pursuing a jointly integrated system to seeking the best means to continue to build on our work together in alternative ways," officials from Elliot Health System said in a statement to Valley News.
The health systems began discussions regarding a potential affiliation in May 2016.