How to Build a Healthcare AI Conference Agenda

By Harvey Castro, MD, MBA, founder of Signal & Stage. This organizer guide is published by the collective and is not an independent speaker ranking. Reviewed November 3, 2026.

A useful healthcare AI agenda gives each session a distinct job. The opening establishes a shared question. Later sessions examine that question from the perspectives needed to make a decision. The closing gives the audience a way to carry the discussion back to work.

Choose the decision before the lineup

Write one sentence describing the audience’s task. A clinical team evaluating documentation tools needs a different program from investors comparing health technology businesses. Record the audience’s roles, familiarity with AI and the examples they need. If the room contains several audiences, separate the learning goals before choosing speakers.

For an implementation meeting, a useful organizing question might be: what must our organization understand before introducing this tool into a workflow? This is a proposed event brief, not a promise that one presentation can resolve procurement, legal or clinical decisions.

Give each part of the program a purpose

1. Opening perspective. Introduce the practical question and terms the audience will use. Harvey’s healthcare AI topics offer a clinical starting point.
2. Accountability discussion. Examine decision authority, oversight and the people affected. Choose governance or cybersecurity expertise according to the question.
3. Adoption conversation. Explore how the proposed change affects work, buying decisions and organizational readiness.
4. Human experience. Make room for communication, trust and patient or staff perspectives that the technical sessions may not cover.
5. Closing application. Ask attendees to record one question to investigate, the evidence they need and who should be involved afterward.

These are agenda functions, not a fixed timetable. Confirm the duration and format each speaker actually offers, including time for questions, transitions and breaks. A workshop requires an agreed exercise, suitable group size and preparation.

Consider complementary speakers

Start with Harvey Castro when the audience needs an emergency physician’s perspective on healthcare AI. Then consider one complementary voice for a specific gap.

• Harvey with Viv Babber MD for a discussion connecting clinical questions with AI governance and human accountability.
• Harvey with Erkeda DeRouen, MD, CPHRM when clinical risk and organizational accountability are central.
• Harvey with Sally Ann Frank to connect clinical use with enterprise adoption.
• Harvey with Amy Kelly, LMFT or Karin Andrea Stephan when the program examines mental health, trust and adoption.

These combinations are starting points for a planning conversation. They are not confirmed joint sessions or new speaker approved talk titles. Use each profile’s approved session wording when developing the proposal.

Prepare a moderator brief

Give the moderator the audience goal, each speaker’s distinct contribution and three questions that connect the sessions. Ask for examples speakers can discuss publicly. Have the moderator distinguish personal experience, research findings and forecasts. Avoid asking a speaker to answer outside their expertise merely because another session ran short.

For a panel, send the questions in advance and identify overlap. Each participant should have a reason to be on stage. A clinician, a governance leader and an adoption specialist can examine different parts of one scenario without repeating the same introduction.

Check the program before announcing it

• Every session has a separate audience purpose.
• Published talk titles and takeaways remain accurate.
• Each speaker has confirmed the proposed format, duration and participation.
• The full presentation and Q&A language are confirmed individually.
• Speaking samples are labeled accurately as stage talks, interviews, reels or short excerpts.
• Recording, streaming, accessibility, travel and commercial arrangements are agreed in writing.

Explore six conference topic groups

• Practical healthcare AI
• AI governance, risk and trust
• Health innovation and business growth
• Mental health and human experience
• Enterprise AI and organizational change
• Leadership, resilience and innovation

Plan the next step

Share your audience, event date, location, presentation and Q&A language, preferred format and the decision the session should support. Use the event planning worksheet and comparison scorecard to record your shortlist.

Speaker combinations are proposals. Confirm each person’s participation, session scope, duration, language, recording permissions and commercial terms before announcing a program. An inquiry does not reserve a date.

Discuss your event with Signal & Stage. For Harvey directly, explore his speaking topics and reel.