Northern Light Health president and CEO announces retirement

BREWER — Timothy Dentry, president and CEO, has announced his pending retirement from Northern Light Health this calendar year.

Dentry has served as president and CEO of Northern Light Health for five years, previously serving as the organization’s chief operating officer beginning in 2016. He held healthcare leadership positions within the United States, and prior to coming to Maine, focused on international health delivery improvement, from Addis Ababa to Abu Dhabi, with institutional backing from Yale University and Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Dentry is credited with leading the statewide healthcare organization through the unprecedented challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and the resulting post-pandemic financial burden that has plagued healthcare institutions throughout the nation. Dentry said Northern Light is fearless in doing the right things to care for the people of Maine. 

In a message to employees, he shared, “Together, we confidently navigated one of the most challenging and unprecedented crises in our century — the COVID-19 pandemic … Whether you served on the front lines or supported our caregivers, you all have made me a better leader by being witness to your unwavering greatness. You not only rose to this challenge with grace, compassionately caring for our patients who were suffering from this evolving virus, but you did so with grit — a true form of grit that is unique to Maine.”

John Ryan, chair of the Northern Light Health Board of Directors, shared, “Tim serves our state with confidence and strength, but perhaps his best qualities are his heart and compassion. Tim loves our Maine communities and truly believes in the employees from Blue Hill to Greenville and Presque Isle to Portland who make up Northern Light Health. Through his tenure, he has led from the front, with his heart, and has inspired positive action and change during exceptionally challenging times. He has been the right leader at the right time.”

During his time as president and CEO, Dentry constantly promoted and reinforced a strong culture of caring, starting with caring for one another among the more than 10,000 employees of Northern Light Health, helping to deliver on our promise to make healthcare work for Maine and create healthier communities. Multiple talent development initiatives came to fruition under his tenure, including the psychiatry residency program, nurse training expansion with the community colleges of Maine, the Roux Institute and physician assistant training for rural health in affiliation with Morehouse School of Medicine. All of these efforts and more contributed to bringing students to Maine for hands-on training and enticing talented young providers to continue their professional careers here.

He is also credited with investing in many Northern Light campuses, such as Blue Hill, CA Dean in Greenville, the One Mercy campus in Portland and obstetric and other services in Ellsworth, as well as increasing capacity to care for behavioral health patients statewide, particularly pediatrics and adolescents.

Dentry added, “With all that I have seen in my last eight-plus years, I know there are many great things yet to come for Northern Light Health and our Maine communities. As my wife and I plan our retirement here in Maine, I look forward with confidence, as a consumer and neighbor, to an ever stronger and compassionate healthcare organization, reflective of the communities we serve.”

Succession planning is always ongoing at Northern Light Health. Dentry and the Northern Light Health Board of Directors have been thinking about and preparing for this transition for several years.  The health system is also working with a national recruiting firm on the selection process.