On Wednesday, officials in the health service voiced their support for Nesbitt, saying he had “offered strong political leadership” and had “listened to clinical leaders”.
They included the Royal College of Surgeons, NI Confederation for Health and Social Care, the British Medical Association.
Stormont’s health committee will convene later with departmental officials, including the department’s permanent secretary, following a request from committee’s chair, Sinn Féin MLA Philip McGuigan.
McGuigan said the committee needed to know what decisions had to be made by any incoming minister.
Analysis – BBC News NI health correspondent Marie-Louise Connolly:
If you think of what happens in a week in the health service, the number of stories and issues – as health minister they are meant to know the inside out back to front of every issue.
They are supposed to met the unions, clinicians, all the royal colleges, everyone who is involved in those stories and I think that’s something that Butler will not have the joy of doing due to the time pressures.
He has a reputation of being very personable, popular and well-liked; but does being nice help you make decisions? And when he’s sitting facing the Royal College of Nurses and the general practice – what then?
In an ideal world, the outgoing health minister Nesbitt would have left a letter for Butler saying: ‘Here’s what I’m leaving, all you have to do is follow my lead, we’re of the same party.’
But have they have left in those circumstances? And now in the mix we’ve got Burrows because of what happened at Causeway Hospital.
So really there are three men in this relationship.