DHMC Exec Resigns As Hospital Announces Layoffs

On the heels of Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s announcement that several hundred employees would be layed off by year’s end due to financial struggles within the medical system, one high-ranking executive has resigned.

John Birkmeyer, executive vise president for integrated delivery systems and chief academic officer, will leave his post Oct. 14 according to a statement released by CEO James Weinstein on Tuesday.

Weinstein said in the statement that “as our health system continues to evolve to meet the health and health care needs of the people and communities we serve, change is an inevitable part of that process.” Birkmeyer has served in the position for two years, and was a key player during Dartmouth-Hitchcock’s transfer of hundreds of jobs from Dartmouth College’s Geisel School of Medicine in both clinical research and psychiatry.

Dartmouth-Hitchcock announced last month it would be laying off as many as 460 employees by the end of 2016, though there was no indication Birkmeyer’s resignation is correlated