For most of the people we meet at Lipedema Team, the hardest part was never the condition itself. It was the years without a name for it. The appointments that ended with "just lose weight." The quiet certainty that something was wrong, and no one was listening.
That history is exactly why I want to share this news personally. Our team is helping headline the 2026 Lipedema Summit, three days of clear, honest education built for people living with this condition and the clinicians caring for them. If you have been searching for real answers in one place, this is the event I would point you to first.
What the Lipedema Summit Is
The 2026 Lipedema Summit is a free, virtual event running June 10 to 12 during Lipedema Awareness Month. It is hosted by Erika Schlick, founder of The Trail to Health, who has navigated her own lipedema journey and has built something genuinely worth showing up for. This year's program brings together more than 40 physicians, surgeons, researchers, therapists, and patient advocates from around the world.
More than 60 professionally produced sessions are organized around the topics that matter most:
- Diagnosis and understanding the condition
- Conservative (non-surgical) care
- Surgery and treatment options
- Recovery and post-operative care
- Hormones, metabolism, and inflammation
- Daily life and long-term management
- Patient stories and expert panels
More than 8,500 people have already registered, making this one of the largest gatherings of lipedema experts and patients ever held. Sessions include closed captions and language options in Spanish and Portuguese, so the education reaches as many people as possible.
Our Role at the Summit
This is the part I am proud of.
Our surgeons, Dr. Max Sirota and Dr. José Carlos Martínez, are among the headlining voices of this year's summit, co-hosting alongside Erika Schlick and other leading experts. You will see them throughout all three days, not in a single talk but woven across the full program. They take part in the opening and closing panels each day and lead dedicated sessions including:
- Foundations of Lipedema Care
- The Multidisciplinary Model in Lipedema Surgery
- Conservative Treatment Strategies Across Disease Stages
- Post-Surgical Recovery: The 21-Day Protocol
Our physical therapy team also joins a session on physiotherapy in lipedema, covering everything from inflammation management through long-term care. That session reflects something central to how we work: good lipedema care is never one specialty working in isolation. It is surgeons, physical therapists, nutritionists, and mental health support working together toward the same outcome for one patient. That is how we built Lipedema Team, and it is the message we are bringing to the summit.
Dr. Sirota and Dr. Martínez will also co-host the summit's in-person evening in Los Angeles on June 11, an intimate gathering that will be livestreamed to the full global audience.
What You Can Expect
Wherever you are in this process, there is something here for you.
If you are still looking for a diagnosis, the early sessions walk through how lipedema is identified and how it differs from obesity and lymphedema. If you are weighing surgery, the surgical panels cover candidacy, techniques, and what recovery actually involves, including our own 21-day protocol. There are also conversations on hormones and GLP-1 medications, nutrition, movement, and pregnancy, as well as patient stories from people who have lived through this journey firsthand.
None of it is fear-based or promotional. It is grounded education from clinicians who understand what this condition takes from people and what it takes to treat it well.
How to Attend
The summit is free to attend live on June 10, 11, and 12. Register here:
Register free for the 2026 Lipedema Summit
Optional All-Access and VIP upgrades are available if you want to watch on your own schedule. They add 12-month replay access, downloadable summaries and transcripts, bonus sessions, and live Q&A with select speakers. Most people start with the free live experience and go from there.
If you are near Los Angeles, the in-person evening on June 11 is a meaningful way to connect with clinicians and fellow patients outside of a screen.
I hope you will join us. Lipedema has been misunderstood and dismissed for far too long, and events like this are how that starts to change. Come learn with us.
Dr. Raquel Vázquez is Clinical Patient Coordinator at Lipedema Team, a multidisciplinary lipedema care center serving patients across the United States, Canada and Mexico.
