The ObesityWeek 2026 scientific program includes nearly a dozen joint and collaborative sessions where researchers and clinicians of The Obesity Society collaborate on presentations with colleagues from other professional societies and organizations to spark cross-disciplinary discussions on cutting-edge research and clinical applications.
“The Obesity Society (TOS) has been working extraordinarily hard on creating these joint and collaborative sessions because obesity care is changing at such an exciting pace. We realized that we need to share the latest, high-level obesity science with other scientists and, vice versa, to hear the expertise of experts in other fields for insights that cross over so well in bringing about the best comprehensive obesity care,” said Renee Rogers, PhD, FTOS.
Dr. Rogers, a senior scientist at the University of Kansas Medical Center and chair of TOS Communications Committee, will present at one of these sessions, Moving Beyond Weight: Physiological and Psychological Engagement for Physical Activity in Obesity Treatment, a collaborative symposium with TOS and the American College of Sports Medicine (ACSM) on Nov. 16. She will be joined in the session by Tim Church, MD, PhD; John Thyfault, PhD, FTOS; and Sara Kovacs, PhD. Michael Donnelly-Boylen, MS, and Sarah Le Brocq BSc (Hons), will lend their expertise as patient advocates and obesity educators who have extensive experience with various groups in transforming the public’s and the field’s understanding of living with obesity.
We realized that we need to share the latest, high-level obesity science with other scientists and, vice versa, to hear the expertise of experts in other fields for insights that cross over so well in bringing about the best comprehensive obesity care.
— Renee Rogers, PhD, FTOS
Dr. Rogers presented a previous version of this session at the American College of Sports Medicine Annual Meeting and World Congresses in May 2026. She said this experience allowed her to bring important insights from obesity medicine to sport and exercise physiologists, such as how to respectfully and effectively work with new patients who live with obesity and might be starting exercise therapy for the first time—a phenomenon that is particularly acute with the wave of patients losing weight with incretin-based therapies.
John Jakicic, PhD, FTOS, joined Dr. Rogers as a presenter at the ACSM meeting. He pointed to specific moments when the benefits of cross-collaboration became apparent.
“These joint presentations help turn light bulbs on for members of each of the societies,” he said. “Dr. Rogers helped sports medicine experts realize that they simply cannot think about applying standard resistance or aerobic training in the exact same way across different populations. In turn, we got questions about specific areas of health we hadn’t yet considered. For example, one of the leaders in women’s health brought up some questions about the nuances of bone health. Dialogue like this really got us thinking about other nuances that might arise when you start to cross over into a completely different discipline that’s not entirely exercise sports medicine, but also not solely obesity medicine space.”
John Jakicic, PhD, FTOS
Dr. Jakicic, professor of physical activity and weight management at the University of Kansas School of Medicine and the president-elect of ACSM, will present at an ObesityWeek collaborative symposium with the Nutrition Obesity Research Centers (NORC), Novel Findings in Nutrition and Obesity Research: Highlighting NORCs Early Career Investigators. He will provide an overview of NORC research opportunities and then hand the stage over to multiple speakers for 5-minute presentations on their innovative NORC-backed studies.
These joint presentations help turn light bulbs on for members of each of the societies.
— John Jakicic, PhD, FTOS
Describing the potential impact of these joint and collaborative sessions, Dr. Jakicic draws an analogy with a transformative and historic scientific discovery—the combination of multiple lenses that led to compound microscopes and advanced telescopes.
“We all have a perspective of how something fits into our work, based on the lens that we look through,” Dr. Jakicic said. “The real benefit of these joint and collaborative sessions comes not from looking at our work through another lens, but by combining two different lenses and figuring out how to harmonize different ideas from different disciplines in a way that opens up a new perspective.”
View the full ObesityWeek conference program at obesityweek.org. Symposium, plenary, Key Lecture, and oral session recordings will be available as part of ObesityWeek OnDemand beginning late January 2027. Purchase ObesityWeek OnDemand through conference registration by Nov. 17.
Complete Listing of Joint and Collaborative Symposia
All listed times are ET. All room locations are in the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center. Listing is current as of Oct. 15, 2026.
