Steward Health Care has agreed to sell its physician network to private-equity backed Rural Healthcare Group for $245 million in cash.

Steward runs eight Bay State hospitals and is in the process of selling or closing them. The for-profit company declared bankruptcy in May. Steward's physician group, known as Stewardship, serves more than 800,000 patients nationwide via roughly 3,250 affiliates, according to a Monday court filing. The group directly employs more than 290 doctors.

The sale's impact on patients isn't immediately clear. The Nashville-based RHG said Monday it plans "significant investments in Stewardship’s infrastructure, which will allow providers to continue seeing patients in existing clinics across the Stewardship network."

Read more at heraldnews.com.