Gov. Phil Bredesen announced Wednesday that Tennessee planned to dissolve its financially troubled program expanding Medicaid, a decision that would cut as many as 430,000 people from state health care rolls.

The governor held out some hope for saving the program, called TennCare, saying he would try for seven more days to work out an agreement with advocates who have won several court decisions on the level of health care the state must provide to TennCare enrollees.

But Mr. Bredesen, speaking at a news conference, said an agreement was unlikely, and a lawyer for TennCare recipients also expressed pessimism.

TennCare offers health care coverage for the poor, the uninsured and the disabled, benefiting 1.3 million Tennesseans, or about 22 percent of the state's population. If it is eliminated, those dropped from the state's rolls would largely be families of the working poor whose income exceeds Medicaid's limits. The remaining 900,000 or so would continue to get coverage under basic Medicaid.

Mr. Bredesen, a first-term Democrat, ran for governor two years ago with a promise either to fix or to end TennCare, whose annual cost of $7.8 billion - $2.5 billion from the state, most of the rest from the federal government - was projected to mushroom in coming years.

Until now, all TennCare participants have had unlimited doctor visits and prescriptions. Under the stripped-down plan that the governor wanted to adopt, 270,000 of the beneficiaries would be facing annual limits of 12 doctor visits, 45 days in the hospital, 8 outpatient hospital visits and 10 laboratory procedures or X-rays, as well as a monthly limit of 6 prescriptions.