SAN FRANCISCO -- The White House will be well-represented as the GLMA: Health Professionals Advancing LGBT Equality will hold its annual conference in San Francisco from Wednesday through Sunday, Sept. 19 to 23.

At the conference, LGBT and ally health professionals will attend workshops and plenary sessions on a wide range of health and healthcare issues affecting the LGBT community, and will have the unique opportunity to network with fellow professionals from across the United States and other parts of the world.

This year’s conference will weave political and social issues through sessions addressing LGBT health and policy.

Keynote speaker Mary Wakefield, administrator of the Health Resources Services Administration of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, will share how the Affordable Care Act and other federal policies address LGBT health needs.

Grant Colfax, director of the White House Office of National AIDS Policy, will share the latest on the National HIV/AIDS Strategy and efforts to implement the strategy. Before joining the White House, Colfax was the director of HIV Prevention in the San Francisco Department of Public Health.

Other plenary topics and speakers include:

* Health and Wellness of Older People who are LGBT and/or People of Color organized by SAGE – Services and Advocacy for GLBT Elders

* The Evolution of Transgender Health and Practice for the Stanley Biber Memorial Lecture on Transgender Health organized by UCSF’s Center for Excellence for Transgender Health

* GLMA’s new recommendations for LGBT inclusion in health professional education

* Groundbreaking results of a longitudinal study of planned lesbian families for the Kimberly Clermont Memorial Lecture on Lesbian Health

* How health professionals can support the needs of LGBTQ youth

* A case study of 5 states, including California, implementing health care reform in ways to address the health needs of LGBT people

* The Family Acceptance Project, the first evidence-based family intervention model of wellness, prevention and case for LGBT children and adolescents

The annual conference also will feature workshops and original research on a broad range of LGBT health topics.

GLMA’s Gala Banquet and Achievement Awards Recognition on Saturday, Sept. 22, at the Green Room of the San Francisco War Memorial, will honor six pioneers for their outstanding contributions to LGBT health and the LGBT community. The Kinsey Sicks — “America’s Favorite Dragapella Beautyshop Quartet” — will perform at the Gala Banquet. (Ben Schatz, a founder and member of the Kinsey Sicks, is also a past GLMA executive director.) The GLMA Achievement Awards are sponsored with a generous contribution from Pfizer.

The 2012 GLMA Achievement Award recipients are:

Peggy L Chinn, RN, PhD, FAAN

Professor emerita, University of Connecticut School of Nursing

Bobby Kelly, MD

AMSA/GLMA Achievement Award Recipient

Dennis J McShane, MD

Founding GLMA President

Caitlin Ryan, PhD, ACSW

Founder and director of the Family Acceptance Project

Lyon-Martin Health Services & Dawn Harbatkin, MD, executive director/medical director

National Center for Lesbian Rights

For more information, including a complete schedule, see the official GLMA 30th Annual Conference site HERE.

Aetna and Cigna are lead sponsors of the GLMA Annual Conference.

WHEN/WHERE:

GLMA 30th Annual Conference

Sept. 19-23, 2012

Westin San Francisco Market Street

50 Third St., San Francisco

WHO: For a complete list of speakers, award recipients and programming, see www.glma.org/conference.

Registration: Registration will be available onsite.

GLMA is the world's largest association of gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) — and ally — healthcare professionals. Since 1981, GLMA has been working to ensure equality in healthcare for LGBT individuals and healthcare professionals through advocacy, education, research and referrals. Please visit our website HERE.