If you have been looking for Sector - Health funds, a place to start could be T. Rowe Price Health Sciences (PRHSX Quick QuotePRHSX - Free Report) . PRHSX possesses a Zacks Mutual Fund Rank of 1 (Strong Buy), which is based on nine forecasting factors like size, cost, and past performance.

Objective

Zacks categorizes PRHSX as Sector - Health, a segment packed with options. Sector - Health mutual funds offer investors a focus on the healthcare industry, one of the largest sectors in the American economy. These funds can include everything from pharmaceutical companies to medical device manufacturers and for-profit hospitals.

History of Fund/Manager

PRHSX is a part of the T. Rowe Price family of funds, a company based out of Baltimore, MD. The T. Rowe Price Health Sciences made its debut in December of 1995 and PRHSX has managed to accumulate roughly $15.75 billion in assets, as of the most recently available information. Ziad Bakri is the fund's current manager and has held that role since April of 2016.

Performance

Investors naturally seek funds with strong performance. This fund in particular has delivered a 5-year annualized total return of 18.46%, and is in the top third among its category peers. If you're interested in shorter time frames, do not dismiss looking at the fund's 3-year annualized total return of 20.01%, which places it in the top third during this time-frame.

When looking at a fund's performance, it is also important to note the standard deviation of the returns. The lower the standard deviation, the less volatility the fund experiences. Compared to the category average of 17.16%, the standard deviation of PRHSX over the past three years is 19.51%. Looking at the past 5 years, the fund's standard deviation is 17.14% compared to the category average of 14.91%. This makes the fund more volatile than its peers over the past half-decade.

Risk Factors

Investors should not forget about beta, an important way to measure a mutual fund's risk compared to the market as a whole. PRHSX has a 5-year beta of 0.89, which means it is likely to be less volatile than the market average. Alpha is an additional metric to take into consideration, since it represents a portfolio's performance on a risk-adjusted basis relative to a benchmark, which in this case, is the S&P 500. PRHSX has generated a positive alpha over the past five years of 2.76, demonstrating that managers in this portfolio are skilled in picking securities that generate better-than-benchmark returns.

Expenses

Costs are increasingly important for mutual fund investing, and particularly as competition heats up in this market. And all things being equal, a lower cost product will outperform its otherwise identical counterpart, so taking a closer look at these metrics is key for investors. In terms of fees, PRHSX is a no load fund. It has an expense ratio of 0.76% compared to the category average of 1.32%. PRHSX is actually cheaper than its peers when you consider factors like cost.

While the minimum initial investment for the product is $2,500, investors should also note that each subsequent investment needs to be at least $100.

Bottom Line

Overall, T. Rowe Price Health Sciences ( PRHSX ) has a high Zacks Mutual Fund rank, and in conjunction with its comparatively strong performance, average downside risk, and lower fees, T. Rowe Price Health Sciences ( PRHSX ) looks like a good potential choice for investors right now.

This could just be the start of your research on PRHSXin the Sector - Health category. Consider going to www.zacks.com/funds/mutual-funds for additional information about this fund, and all the others that we rank as well for additional information. For analysis of the rest of your portfolio, make sure to visit Zacks.com for our full suite of tools which will help you investigate all of your stocks and funds in one place.