2009 is fast coming to an end, to the great relief of many investors. While the market has staged a nice comeback since the spring and the economy seems to be slowly righting itself, things are still rough out there. Jobs are increasingly hard to come by, and consumers have been keeping a lid on spending.

At this point, a lot of folks seem to be eager to just get 2009 over with already and hope that the new year will usher in meaningful economic improvement. But while no one knows exactly what next year has in store for us, there is one sector of the market that many in-the-know fund gurus are expecting big things from.

A clean bill of health
According to a recent survey conducted by FTI Consulting, fund managers at many of the world's largest investment firms are looking to health care as their favorite sector in 2010. Among survey respondents, 15% cited health care as their top pick for next year, compared to 12% who chose technology.

The report suggests that although managers are favoring cyclical recovery stocks right now, they believe that financially solid health-care names with solid cash flows should do well in the coming year. This outlook comes even as much of the health-care sector has struggled to capture the gains that many other areas of the market have in 2009. For example, biotechnology firms Amgen (NASDAQ:AMGN) and Gilead Sciences (NASDAQ:GILD) are both in negative territory year-to-date, despite the general market being up more than 20%.

Of course, the looming unknown on the health-care horizon is the massive reform bill currently working its way through our legislature. While the details are still being hammered out and the bill's future is uncertain, there's likely to be a lot of cash flowing into this sector if reform becomes a reality, and a resulting sector boom is not out of the question. Regardless of how you feel about the prospect of health-care reform, it's hard to argue that the potential benefits to this sector won't be significant if reform does work its way through.

Paging Dr. Profits
One big-name manager who has thrown his lot in with the health care sector is Bruce Berkowitz of the top-rated Fairholme Fund (FAIRX). Thanks to Berkowitz's timely stock picks, Fairholme has outpaced 99% of all large-cap blend funds over the past five years. Berkowitz has allocated a whopping 36% of its stock portfolio to health-care companies, with top holding Pfizer (NYSE:PFE) alone making up almost 13% of the entire fund. He also has slightly smaller bets on biotech firm Forest Laboratories (NYSE:FRX) and health-care insurer WellPoint (NYSE:WLP).

Berkowitz may be on to something. While many investors are hunkering down with bonds and relatively staid consumer stocks, now may be the time to act to capitalize on 2010's hottest trend. Health-care stocks are at the bottom of the barrel when it comes to this year's top performers, so valuations are still relatively reasonable. Once the sector takes off, you'll have already missed out on a lot of potential gains, so the time to stock up on high-quality health-care names is now.

Scheduling a checkup
So how can you make the most of a coming resurgence in the health-care sector? Well, if you want specified exposure, you can always go with an exchange-traded fund or actively managed fund that invests exclusively in this corner of the market.

One of the better actively managed funds out there is T. Rowe Price Health Sciences (PRHSX), which has racked up an 8.4% annualized gain over the past 10 years. The fund tends to favor small- and mid-cap names like Alexion Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:ALXN) and biotech drug firm Cephalon (NASDAQ:CEPH), so there's lots of growth potential in this portfolio. However, if you do buy a sector-specific fund like this, make sure to keep your overall allocation small to avoid undue risk.

But you don't necessarily need dedicated health-care exposure to capitalize on a boom in this sector. Even by maintaining a diversified overall portfolio, you'll still reap the benefits. Health-care stocks typically have a major presence in most broad market mutual funds, so you'll still have reasonable exposure.

In fact, according to Morningstar data, the average large-cap growth fund has almost 15% of assets allocated to the health-care sector. So assuming you've got wide market coverage, you'll be able to profit from a health-care boom without changing anything in your portfolio at all!

There's a lot of uncertainty and hesitation surrounding the health-care sector right now, which makes it an ideal time to think about getting into the game. If the experts are correct, the payoff next year could be just what the doctor ordered!

Learn more about the current health-care debate. Brian Orelli explains how the reform story is a tale of two chambers.