14th Annual Health Equity Symposium - 2026
In-Sync: “One Beat, Many Voices: Advancing Equity Together”
June 30 - July 1 | Center for Healthcare Innovation, 625 W. Adams St., Chicago, IL 60661.
About the symposium
The 14th Annual Health Equity Symposium will be held June 30 - July 1 in Chicago. This event brings together doctors, community leaders, researchers, and workforce partners to talk about how we can make healthcare and career opportunities more fair for everyone.
This year’s theme is From Access to Advancement: Building Communities of Resources. We will focus on how people not only get access to care and opportunities, but also how they can grow, succeed, and stay supported over time.
On Day One, we will talk about healthcare systems, clinical trials, and how communities and providers can work better together. Speakers and panelists will discuss barriers people face, like lack of access and trust, and share ideas that are working in real communities. Small group sessions will give attendees a chance to talk through problems and solutions together.
On Day Two, we will focus on jobs, mentorship, and career pathways. There will be a career fair with support for resumes and interviews, along with a panel on how to help students and early-career professionals move into strong careers in healthcare and STEM fields.
This symposium is about learning from each other, building partnerships, and taking real steps to improve health and opportunity in our communities.
Symposium AGENDA
VIEW PREVIOUS Symposia
Understanding Our Current Audience & Expanding Reach
Our Annual Summit attracts a strong base of healthcare industry professionals, with particularly high participation from leadership, corporate, and advocacy sectors. Attendees currently represent a wide range of roles across healthcare organizations, pharmaceutical companies, and patient engagement teams, including:
Expanding Our Audience
To further strengthen the Summit’s impact and ensure a more comprehensive representation of the healthcare ecosystem, we aim to expand participation among direct-care providers, frontline clinicians, and community-based professionals, particularly those working in underserved and rural settings.
We are actively seeking to engage:
Physicians (MDs, DOs), Nurse Practitioners, and Physician Assistants
Registered Nurses and Clinical Care Teams
Pharmacists
Social Workers and Case Managers
Mental Health and Substance Use Professionals
Community Health Workers and Patient Navigators
Public Health and Health Department Professionals
Academic Researchers and Clinical Investigators
Medical and Health Professions Students
2026 Health Equity Symposium Goals
Strengthen cross-sector collaboration by equipping healthcare, public health, and community-based leaders with the tools to work in sync across disease states, systems, and industries.
Expand and diversify engagement among clinical providers, community organizations, and healthcare stakeholders who assess, counsel, treat, and connect individuals to comprehensive, whole-person care.
Bridge gaps between community and system-level stakeholders by elevating the Center for Healthcare Innovation’s Community Circles model—supporting organizations working within specific disease states while fostering shared learning, alignment, and collective impact.
Create pathways for inclusion and representation by building a stronger pipeline of leaders from historically underrepresented communities, including those from the global majority and rural settings.
Advance integrated, whole-person care strategies by connecting insights across disease areas and encouraging coordinated responses that reflect the real, lived experiences of communities.
Shift from siloed approaches to systems thinking by highlighting how collaboration across sectors can strengthen health outcomes, improve organizational sustainability, and accelerate impact.
Address upstream drivers of health inequities by supporting leaders in identifying and responding to the structural, social, and political factors that shape health outcomes across communities.
Working In Sync: A Connected Approach to Health Equity
The 2026 Health Equity Symposium centers on a simple but powerful idea: we go further when we move in sync.
Health challenges do not exist in isolation—and neither should our solutions. Across disease states, sectors, and communities, there is a growing need to move beyond fragmented approaches and toward intentional alignment, shared learning, and coordinated action.
Through the Center for Healthcare Innovation’s Community Circles model, this Symposium highlights what it means to:
Work directly with community-based organizations rooted in specific disease areas
Bridge connections between clinical, public health, and community systems
Share best practices, lived experiences, and proven strategies across networks
Strengthen both organizational stability and collective impact
Rather than operating in silos, Community Circles create space for organizations to learn from one another, align priorities, and amplify what works—resulting in more responsive, sustainable, and equitable health solutions.
An Integrated Approach to Health Equity
Health equity requires us to recognize that multiple factors—medical, social, economic, and structural—intersect to shape outcomes. No single issue exists on its own, and no single sector can solve these challenges alone.
The Health Equity Symposium brings together leaders from across the ecosystem to explore how aligned, cross-sector strategies can:
Improve care delivery and access
Strengthen community trust and engagement
Support whole-person health and wellbeing
Drive long-term, systemic change
This is more than a convening—it is a call to align, collaborate, and act together.
