Nicco Montano’s reign as the inaugural UFC women’s flyweight champion has come to an end.

UFC President Dana White today told TSN that the flyweight championship is now vacant, and No. 1 contender Valentina Shevchenko (15-3 MMA, 4-2 UFC) will fight an opponent later this year to determine the new titleholder.

“The belt becomes vacated, so the title is vacated,” White later said during the UFC 228 weigh-in show on FS1. “Obviously, Shevchenko is dying to fight for this title. So we’re in the process right now of trying to make another fight before the end of the year.”

Montano (4-2 MMA, 1-0 UFC) was not immediately reachable for comment. Her coach and manager, Tom Vaughn, told MMAjunkie he has “not heard anything from UFC directly.”

Montano, 29, was scratched from her first title fight this morning when she was taken to an area hospital out of concern for her medical safety. She never weighed in for the event, which takes place Saturday at American Airlines Center in Dallas.

Montano’s teammate today told MMAFighting.com that Montano was cutting weight when the UFC’s medical team determined she couldn’t continue and transported her to the hospital to address her kidney function.

Earlier today, Vaughn told MMAjunkie it was not Montano’s choice to stop the weight-cutting process. He added the now ex-champ was treated and released from the hospital. He declined further comment.

Montano becomes the second female UFC champion to be stripped of a title before defending it. The inaugural women’s featherweight title was taken from Germaine de Randamie when she refused to face No. 1 contender and current champ Cris Cyborg.

In the wake of Montano’s removal, a women’s strawweight bout between title contenders Jessica Andrade and Karolina Kowalkiewicz was bumped to the co-main event of the pay-per-view card, while a bantamweight fight between John Dodson and Jimmie Rivera was bumped up to the main card.

Shevchenko released a statement strongly criticizing Montano’s actions and questioned the official version of her story.

“I told it before, she can pull out from the fight at anytime,” Shevchenko wrote on her Instagram page. “She was trying to avoid this fight several times already. It is my (third) preparation for this fight.

“Looks like it was her plan from the beginning, to show up for the fight week, to build up her name, speak confident and secure, and then escape from the fight in the last minutes.”

Shevchenko will be compensated for the canceled fight, according to a ESPN.com reporter Ariel Helwani.

For more on UFC 228, check out the UFC Rumors section of the site.