Health Care Lateral Hiring in 2026: Growth Below the Partner Line

Health care lateral hiring outpaced the wider legal market over the past year, but the partner tier did not share in the rise. Sartori & Partners data show health care laterals rose 14.5% in the settled 12-month window to September 2026, from 379 to 434, while moves across all practices rose 9.0%. Partner moves in the practice went from 150 to 160, a change of 6.7% that is flat at counts this small. A firm planning a health care partner hire faces a busier market with no more partners moving in it.

Take the partners out of the two settled windows and the source of the growth is plain. Moves other than partner moves went from 229 to 274, while the partner count stayed flat. The market did not split that way. Across all practices, partner moves rose 8.4%, from 3,558 to 3,858, close to the 9.0% rise in total moves. In health care, then, the gap with the market opens below the partner line and closes at it.

The yearly series gives the same picture from a longer distance. Health care recorded 391 lateral moves in 2025 and 380 in 2026 through October, against 284 in 2023. Partner moves ran at 149 in 2025 and 144 so far in 2026. The two neighboring regulatory practices did not grow at all. Regulatory and compliance moves were flat, at 420 and then 422, and public law and government was flat too, at 324 and then 308. For a hiring firm, the extra health care movers are mostly junior: budget associate and counsel searches for a deeper pool, and partner searches for the same thin one.

A flat partner count does not mean health care is light on partners. Partners were 36.3% of health care lateral moves in the 12 months to October 2026, against 27.7% across the market. Associates were 50.1%, against 58.5%. The tilt is not new. Over 3 years, partners were 37.1% of the practice's 1,153 moves, against 26.9% for the market as a whole.

Health care work rewards a partner who brings a regulator relationship or a provider client base, so firms buy experience laterally rather than wait for it. In the Sartori & Partners lateral database, 13.6% of health care laterals joined at a higher title than the one they left, against 12.9% in the market. The practice was partner-heavy before this year and stays so, which is why a flat partner count bites: the demand is structural and the supply did not grow with it.

Health care partner hiring runs through a short list of firms. The top 10 hirers took 34.0% of health care partner moves in the 12 months to October 2026, against 13.5% across all practices, 2.5 times the market's concentration. Across all levels the top 10 took 25.0%, against 12.9%. Regulatory and compliance is concentrated as well, but less: its top 10 take 25.4% of partner moves and 21.8% of all its hires. In public law and government the top 10 take 22.0% of all hires, also below health care.

The most active partner hirer, Polsinelli, sits in the 6-10 band of partner hires. Health care laterals joined 205 firms in all, out of 1,291 that hired in any practice. A concentrated buyer side tells a hiring firm whom it is bidding against. A health care partner in play can expect approaches from firms on that list, and a process that waits for a second round of interviews competes with offers already on the table.

Washington took 12.6% of health care lateral moves, against 5.6% of all moves, an index of 225 where the market's own share reads as one hundred. New York goes the other way: 7.6% of health care moves against 14.8% of the market, an index of 51. Chicago reads 118 and Los Angeles 95. Over 3 years Washington held 11.4% of health care moves against 5.2% of the market, and Nashville, a provider hub, took 3.4%.

Health care is less tied to Washington than its regulatory neighbors. Regulatory and compliance indexes at 298 there and public law and government at 464. A health care search should open in Washington, then cover Chicago and the provider markets, and treat New York as a secondary pool rather than the default.

Companies pull harder on health care lawyers than on the market at large. Since May 2026, the first month we track these moves in full, health care lawyers moved to companies at 18.4 for every hundred lateral moves, against 13.1 across all practices. The rate is 7.9 in regulatory and compliance and 11.1 in public law and government. Hospital systems, insurers and life sciences businesses all keep legal teams that hire from the same firm benches. There is no earlier period to compare with, so this is a level, not a trend. For a firm, it means part of every health care bench it is trying to build or keep is being courted by clients, not only by rival firms.

Separate the two searches. Associate and counsel hiring in health care runs in a larger pool than last year, and a firm can be selective there. Partner hiring does not: in Sartori & Partners figures the partner count was flat while total moves rose 14.5%, so each partner who moves draws more bidders. Start partner searches earlier, expect most candidates to be people who are not looking, and plan for a longer close.

Know the rivals by name. With the top 10 taking 34.0% of partner moves, the competing offer usually comes from a firm on that list, and the terms they set become the reference. Map Washington first, where the practice indexes at 225, and keep retention in view at home: with 18.4 moves to companies per hundred laterals, the next departure from a health care team may go to a client.