Dr. Jeffrey Bland is a personable and highly respected thought leader who has spent more than four decades focused on the improvement of human health. He is known worldwide as the founder of the Functional Medicine movement, which represents his vision for a care model that is grounded in systems biology and informed by research that he has a unique ability to synthesize. His pioneering work has created the Personalized Lifestyle Medicine Institute (PLMI), as well as the Institute for Functional Medicine (IFM), the global leader in Functional Medicine education. Since 1991, hundreds of thousands of healthcare practitioners have participated in PLMI and IFM programs, and this collective knowledge has positively impacted the lives of patients all over the world.

Dr. Bland is the author of best-selling books and over 120 peer-reviewed research publications. He speaks extensively, and his engaging style makes him popular with professional audiences. Dr. Bland’s latest project is Big Bold Health, launched in 2018. He’s on a mission to transform the way people think about one of nature’s greatest innovations: the immune system. Through Big Bold Health, Dr. Bland is advocating for the power of immuno-rejuvenation to enhance immunity at a global level. It is an ambitious and purpose-driven effort that encompasses his active stance on regenerative agriculture, environmental stewardship, and planetary health.

Dr. Deanna Minich is a nutrition researcher, educator, and functional medicine-trained clinician with a unique approach to nutrition that combines physiology and psychology. She has served on the Institute of Functional Medicine’s Nutrition Advisory Board and curriculum committee, in addition to being a faculty member, teaching nutrition for the Advanced Practice Module for Environmental Health. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for the American Nutrition Association and is President of the American College of Nutrition. 

Her academic background is in nutritional science, including a Master’s Degree in Human Nutrition and Dietetics from the University of Illinois at Chicago (1995), and a Ph.D. in Medical Sciences (Nutrition) from the University of Groningen in The Netherlands (1999). In conjunction with her academic degrees and extensive teaching experience at the university level, she is a Fellow of the American College of Nutrition and a Certified Nutrition Specialist. 

Dr. Minich has over twenty years of experience working in both the food and dietary supplement industries, and has more than forty published scientific articles in journals such as Nutrients, Journal of Nutrition and Metabolism, and Nutrition Reviews. She teaches for the graduate program (MS) in Human Nutrition and Functional Medicine at the University of Western States and serves as advisor to various food, academic and health organizations. She is the author of six books on nutrition, wellness, and psychology, and is passionate in helping others to live well using therapeutic lifestyle changes.
Visit her at: www.deannaminich.com 

William B. Grant, PhD, was educated as a physicist at University of California, Berkeley, and had a 30-year career in laser remote sensing of atmospheric constituents. His foray into health studies resulted in the first article linking diet to risk of Alzheimer’s disease in 1997. His next major article, in 2002, greatly expanded the list of types of cancer that UVB exposure reduced through vitamin D production.

After retirement from NASA in 2004, he founded Sunlight, Nutrition and Health Research Center (www.sunarc.org), a non-profit organization in San Francisco, dedicated to research and education regarding preventing and treating chronic and infectious diseases through diet, vitamin D, and sun exposure. His publications include articles and/or reviews on Alzheimer’s disease, autism, cancer, dental caries, influenza, periodontal disease, pneumonia, pregnancy, rheumatoid arthritis, vitamin D fortification and supplementation, and methodological aspects of epidemiological research. He turned his attention to the role of vitamin D in reducing risk of COVID-19 in early 2020 and has published several reviews on the mechanisms and epidemiology. A review he organized on vitamin D and COVID-19 has over 850 citations at Scholar.google.com. He has 284 publications on vitamin D listed at pubmed.gov. He ranks in the top ten of Expertise in Vitamin D: Worldwide.

www.expertscape.com

Patrick Holford is a leading spokesman on nutrition and founder of the Institute for Optimum Nutrition. He is the author of 45 books, translated into over 30 languages, including The Optimum Nutrition Bible, Optimum Nutrition for the Mind and and Ten Secrets of 100% Healthy People and his latest books Flu Fighters, The 5 Day Diet and Optimum Nutrition for Vegans.

Patrick was involved in groundbreaking research showing that multivitamins can increase children’s IQ scores – the subject of a Horizon television documentary in the 1980s. He was one of the first promoters of the importance of zinc, essential fats, low-GL diets and homocysteine-lowering B vitamins and their importance in mental health. He helped start the whole profession of nutritional therapy in the UK, founding the Institute for Optimum Nutrition in London in 1984.

Patrick is also founder of the charitable Food for the Brain Foundation with helps those with mental health issues through nutrition and offers a Cognitive Function Test for Alzheimer’s prevention. He is founder of the campaign www.vitaminC4covid.com helping save lives from covid-19 worldwide.

Justine Bold has worked as an academic at the University of Worcester for over twelve and a half years. She is now also Programme Director for CPD in the Medical School at Cardiff University. She has written articles on infertility, appeared in the media and coedited a book entitled ‘Integrated approaches to Infertility, IVF and Recurrent Miscarriage’ that was published in 2016. She has published widely in academic journals on gluten and coeliac disease and also on the integrative management of female health problems. She is working towards PhD by publication having also co-authored a book on Mental Health in 2019 and recently contributed chapters to an upcoming text book ‘Gluten related disorders’ to be published by Elsevier.

Justine had a long personal journey to motherhood starting with a pregnancy loss in her early thirties finally becoming a mum in her forties. She is passionate about raising awareness about the infertility experience and in helping healthcare professionals to understand patients and clients to improve patient care. She appeared at FertilityFest in 2018 and at the Fertility Show in Manchester in 2019.