Thousands convene in Anaheim for AAMC annual meeting
Leaders, faculty, and staff from the nation’s medical schools, academic health systems and teaching hospitals, and academic societies will gather in Anaheim, Calif. from Nov. 6-10 for Learn Serve Lead 2026: The AAMC Annual Meeting. As the AAMC marks its 150th anniversary this year, the meeting will feature discussions and presentations covering pressing issues impacting academic medicine, health and health policy, medical research funding, the state of the physician workforce, and more. AAMC experts will be available on-site to discuss a wide range of issues facing the academic medicine community.
Nationally recognized speakers include Nadine Burke Harris, MD, MPH, FAAP, Pediatrician and California’s First Surgeon General; Joel Bervell, MD, Peabody Award Winner Science Communicator; “Doctor Mike” Varshavski, DO, Board-certified Family Medicine Physician Influencer; Stacy Schiff, Pulitzer Prize-Winning Author; Kelly Corrigan, Bestselling Author, Host of “Tell Me More” on PBS and Kelly Corrigan Wonders Podcast; Michael Waldrum, MD, MSc, MBA, CEO, ECU Health and Dean, Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University; Chair, AAMC Board of Directors; Nita Ahuja, MD, MBA, FACS, Dean, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health for Vice Chancellor for Medical Affairs, UW–Madison; Chair-elect, AAMC Board of Directors; and David J. Skorton, MD, AAMC president and CEO.
All credentialed media are invited to attend the meeting and must pre-register with the AAMC. The meeting fee will be waived for approved media attendees. To request a press pass, email press@aamc.org with your name, media outlet, email, telephone number, and beats/areas of interest. Specify “Annual Meeting Media Registration” in the subject line. The AAMC will review and respond to all requests within approximately two business days. The deadline for media registration is Friday, Oct. 30 at 5 p.m. ET.
Established in 1876, the AAMC is a nonprofit association dedicated to improving the health of people everywhere through medical education, clinical care, biomedical research, and community collaborations. Its members are all 163 U.S. medical schools accredited by the Liaison Committee on Medical Education; 11 Canadian medical schools accredited by the Committee on Accreditation of Canadian Medical Schools; more than 400 academic health systems and teaching hospitals; and more than 70 academic societies. The AAMC also collaborates with the Department of Veterans Affairs and VA medical centers through their academic affiliations with AAMC-member institutions. Through these institutions and organizations, the AAMC leads and serves America’s medical schools, academic health systems and teaching hospitals, and the millions of individuals across academic medicine, including more than 220,000 full-time faculty members, 100,000 medical students, 167,000 resident physicians, and 60,000 graduate students and postdoctoral researchers in the biomedical sciences. Through the Alliance of Academic Health Centers International, AAMC membership reaches more than 60 international academic health centers throughout five regional offices across the globe.
The program tracks are Advocacy and the Current Policy Environment; Biomedical Research and Discovery in Changing Times; Care Transformation and Workforce Development; Institutional Leadership and Governance; Learner Access, Support, and Transitions; and Medical Education Curriculum, Assessment, and Research. Each track brings selected sessions and networking opportunities around key themes in academic medicine.
The event themes include advocating for and elevating the voice of academic medicine, championing discovery and strengthening the research workforce, educating for the future, ensuring communities can thrive, leading with purpose, agility, and resilience amid unprecedented pressure, radically reimagining the future of health care, and transforming the health care workforce of tomorrow.
View the full list of speakers and the program tracks to learn about the focus areas that will be covered at the meeting.
