The Lake Nona Impact Forum will see leaders from health, wellbeing, technology and business gather in Florida during 8-10 March 2023.

The annual event brings together hundreds of leaders committed to improving human health on a global scale with a mission of developing and discussing long-term strategies that will catalyse the industry worldwide.

The invite-only event will feature an array of speakers from across the health spectrum and, as in previous years, be hosted at the Lake Nona wellness community in Orlando, Florida.

Established more than two decades ago, Lake Nona is a 17-square-mile community created with the vision of building the ideal place to inspire human potential through innovation.

The population has steadily grown and now tens of thousands of people live, work and study in Lake Nona. The community is also home to some of the nation’s top universities, hospitals and research institutions where internationally acclaimed healthcare experts have launched businesses and pioneered first-of-its-kind advancements in their fields.

"Since its inception 11 years ago, Lake Nona Impact Forum’s North Star is to inspire human potential through health and wellbeing innovation,” said event founder Gloria Caulfield (check out her exclusive interview with Spa Business here).

“As the meaning of wellbeing has evolved, so have the discussions and luminaries we host, from the effects of the healthcare sector on climate change to the potential benefits of psychedelic therapy for mental health.

“Our long-term goal is to be an incubator that accelerates health and wellbeing innovation and sparks global change needed for public health, health systems and beyond.”

The programme

Throughout the event, creative thinkers will engage in conversations for extraordinary times including a dynamic mix of government and policy leaders, physicians and healthcare pioneers, prolific academics, tech visionaries from Fortune 50 companies to start-ups, professional athletes and entertainers, CEOs and C-Suite executives and more.

This year’s programme will feature discussions on topics including climate change and public health, brain health, health equity for children and women, cancer prevention, food as medicine and more.

Among the dozens of conversations taking place throughout the event, a few of the key panel discussions will include:

Remarkable Women Leading Global Change: featuring Dr Chelsea Clinton, vice chair of both the Clinton Foundation and Clinton Health Access Initiative; Lauren Bush, founder and chief brand officer, FEED; and Noor Sweid, managing partner, Global Ventures; moderated by Alyson Shontell, editor-in-chief and CCO, Fortune Media.

The Repercussions of Healthcare on Climate Change: Setting national policy and global standards around the decarbonization of healthcare will be discussed by Dr Victor Dzau, president, National Academy of Medicine; Dr Rachel Levine, admiral, US Public Health Service, assistant secretary for health, US Department of Health and Human Services; George Barrett, founder, The Overtone Group; and Dr Jonathan Perlin, president and CEO, The Joint Commission; moderated by Juju Chang, Emmy Award-winning co-anchor, ABC News’ “Nightline.”

Psychedelics: The Trip of Our LifetimeFrom the world’s foremost researchers on psychedelic medicine, promising findings on profound mental health conditions in this category will be shared by Dr Rick Doblin, founder and executive director of Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies; Dr Rachel Yehuda, director, Center for Psychedelic Psychotherapy and Trauma Research, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai; Dr Robin Carhart-Harris, Ralph Metzner distinguished professor, neurology and psychiatry and director, Psychedelics Division, Neuroscape, The University of California San Francisco; Paul Stamets, mycologist, inventor, author and entrepreneur; and Dr Deepak Chopra, co-founder, The Chopra Foundation and chair of Chopra Global.

Coinciding with and celebrating International Women’s Day (8 March), prolific leaders at the will be speaking about equity for women in business and featured prominently throughout the three-day event including:

• Karen Lynch – CVS Health president and CEO.

• Dr Kizzmekia Corbett – Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health assistant professor of immunology and infectious disease, whose NIH team co-designed the leading COVID-19 vaccine mRNA-1273.• Geena Davis – Academy Award-winning actress.

• Doris Taylor – Organamet Bio CEO Doris Taylor.