Lake Forest, Illinois-based private equity firm RoundTable Healthcare Partners exited its portfolio company, Ascent Healthcare Solutions, in a $525 million cash transaction.

The buyer, Stryker Corporation, is a listed, Kalamazoo, Michigan-based medical technology company. Related to the transaction, Ascent will pay its shareholders the roughly $35 million in cash that was held on its balance sheet, driving the proceeds up to $560 million.

Ascent is a healthcare and medical device reprocessor that was created from a December 2005 merger between Lakeland, Florida-based Vanguard Medical Concepts, Inc. and Phoenix, Arizona-based Alliance Medical Corporation. The healthcare-focused private equity firm controlled Ascent’s precursor, Vanguard Medical, since September 2001.

For RoundTable, the exit translates to an eight times return on its initial investment. The transaction was led by Joseph F. Damico, a founding partner of RoundTable and non-executive chairman of Ascent.

In May, the private equity firm purchased NGInstruments, Inc., in an add-on acquisition for its portfolio company Avalign Technologies, Inc. In March, another RoundTable portfolio company, Vesta Inc., acquired ExtruMed LLC, previously a portfolio company of Inverness Graham Investments and Wedbush Capital Partners.

Recent healthcare transactions have dominated the deal flow in recent months. In October, Coventry Health Care Inc. agreed to buy Preferred Health Systems, Inc.

Calls placed to RoundTable were not returned by press time.