The healthcare industry enters 2026 shaped by one of the most turbulent decades in its history. What began as an acute pandemic response evolved into a prolonged period of disruption marked by workforce shortages, clinician burnout, economic volatility, and shifting care models. Health systems have been forced to adapt in real time, rethinking staffing strategies, care delivery, and financial sustainability while maintaining quality and access. Workforce decisions are no longer operational concerns alone, but strategic imperatives tied directly to organizational resilience and long-term growth.
At the same time, rapid advances in technology—particularly AI-driven platforms, automation, and data analytics—are redefining how care is delivered and how teams are built and supported. For healthcare leaders, understanding which workforce trends will matter most in 2026 is critical to staying competitive, stabilizing teams, and preparing organizations for what comes next.
Below, Prolink’s workforce and clinical experts break down the trends they’re watching for in the coming year.
Vanessa Janus, Chief Workforce Solutions Officer
The healthcare industry will continue to face disruption due to political, social and macroeconomic factors in legislation, staffing mandates, labor shortages and disputes, rising costs, and reduction in government funding to hospitals and healthcare systems. Those factors will continue to increase the financial pressure that organizations face, thus the need to focus on reduction in cost, investing in and/or leveraging technology-based solutions that optimize processes and reduce cost to service, and adapting to new or different talent sourcing models. As your trusted partner, our focus is on offering more effective contingent workforce management solutions integrated with technology and tools that improve operational efficiency and optimize talent pools and channels, enabling a high volume and quality of positive patient care outcomes.
Natalie Jones, Senior Vice President of Clinical Practice and Innovation
As we move into 2026, healthcare will see continued growth in highly specialized roles across both nursing and allied health, requiring clinicians to deepen their expertise in areas such as advanced critical care, robotics-assisted surgery, and complex imaging. This also includes an ongoing need to develop leadership competencies. Upskilling the existing workforce to meet these evolving demands will be critical. This includes creating clear specialty-training pathways, competency based approaches, offering transition-to-specialty programs, and developing AI-literacy initiatives that teach clinicians how to use these tools effectively.
We will continue to see large acquisitions, strategic partnerships and mergers within healthcare with an ongoing demand for outpatient, ambulatory, psychiatric and hospital at home services. This will impact the workforce by requiring the need for broader labor pools. As the real estate and broader job markets strengthen, clinician mobility will rise again, likely fueling renewed nursing shortages as professionals pursue new geographic and career opportunities.
Hunter Smith, Vice President of Workforce Solutions
It’s hard to not see demand remain flat in the first part of 2026. The flu/RSV season hasn’t impacted hospitals, especially children’s hospitals, in the way that I may have anticipated. Although pricing has steadily declined over the past 2–3 years, I believe it will start to level off. Allied demand will continue to rise and will be an opportunity for companies to capitalize on increasing market share if they can show excellence in delivery. The interest in automation and AI to help with predictive scheduling will increase even further next year.
Based on what I’m hearing from healthcare leaders, I believe the biggest opportunity is consolidation of all staffing verticals into a single partnership: Non-clinical, nursing, allied, per diem, and locums. Excellence in per diem and local staffing will be the biggest driver as health systems will be looking to supplement float pools with less expensive contingent labor pools. Additionally, they will look to recognize cost savings through additional rebates and rate normalization. Locums demand will continue to increase as leaders seek to centralize locums under a VMS platform.
Caton Brough, Vice President of Workforce Solutions
In 2025, high-cost travel nursing continued to soften and bill rates normalized. According to SIA, the market declined 6% over the course of the year. However, forecasts point to a modest rebound in 2026, with overall market growth around 2%. In the coming year, I see slight bounce-backs in the travel and per diem markets with locum tenens as the standout growth performer—thanks to factors like physician shortages, burnout reduction, and demand for revenue-generating specialists. The allied health market should see mixed, but resilient performance.
Underlying drivers remain structural: an aging population increasing demand, clinician burnout, retirements (with many Boomer-era providers exiting), and annual nurse job openings around 200,000. Physician shortfalls are projected to reach 86,000 by 2036. Rural and high-acuity areas face the sharpest gaps.
How should the industry react? We’re already seeing a rise in flexible and gig-style models, which will continue in 2026. Leaders exploring hybrid ecosystems blending permanent staff, locums, virtual roles, and internal gig pools to manage variability and reduce burnout. Organizations are also aggressively building pre-credentialed internal pools (including part-timers and retirees) for rapid deployment, minimizing external agency reliance and costs.
Finally, the future of healthcare sits heavily on two factors: The next generation of both technology and talent. Predictive analytics for demand forecasting, AI-driven matching, and optimized scheduling are becoming standard. Platforms are enabling faster placements, better cultural fits, and workload balancing. On the human side of things, loyalty programs for contingent workers (e.g., shift bonuses, wellness support, career development) are expanding. Gen Z clinicians demand flexibility, mentorship, and tech-enabled work—health systems investing here will see the best talent gravitate towards them.
Tiffany Robison, Director of Workforce Solutions
I believe leadership across medium-to-large health systems will continue to face persistent workforce shortages, not only in nursing and allied health, but increasingly in therapy as well. I’m hearing more and more about therapy shortages, with leaders expecting those needs to continue well past 2026.
I’m also consistently hearing a strong emphasis on both quality and cost. Hospitals remain under intense pressure to get more for less. Hospitals are pushing tighter margins and higher expectations for staffing partners. Because of this cost pressure, I believe many smaller organizations will struggle to keep up, causing more to fold. Health systems are going to continue to consolidate their vendor lists. Only higher-performing partners that can deliver speed, quality, and additional perks will be left standing.
Lexie Skrinak, Workforce Solutions Sales Executive
Going into 2026, healthcare staffing still feels tight, but it’s calmer than the chaos of the past few years. In 2025, I noticed a big shift from emergency hiring to smarter planning and more focus on retention, flexibility, and moving talent internally instead of just throwing money at open roles. Nurses, behavioral health, and allied health are still in high demand, while admin roles are slowly being reshaped by automation and AI. Pay growth is cooling a bit, consolidation is continuing, and systems that treat workforce strategy as a business priority and not a quick fix are winning.
Want to stay ahead of the workforce curve?
Our team is here to help. See why healthcare leaders trust us to stay on top of emerging trends.
