The First Talk on Kratom Outside of an Industry Conference
Kratom is still stigmatized in 2025, but it was much more taboo back in the early 2020s and beyond. Education was restricted to webinars or annual conferences by the American Kratom Association (AKA). Education was mainly provided by Dr. Christopher McCurdy, a pharmacist who is the leading kratom researcher in the country. Industry trade shows like CHAMPS were not providing education.
Cannabis was also quite taboo even 15 or 10 years, and I provided the first educational conferences on topics including Cannabis and Women’s Health as the Executive Director of IMPACT Network back in 2015.
It was important to have a variety of voices speak, from pharmacists, to neuroscientist, to doctors, to nurses, to patients, and veterans. A diversity of voices makes for a balanced point of view and prevents unconscious bias or corporate interests.
This diversity of voices was missing from the kratom world for the most part until recently, where we now have several kratom podcasts and talks at conferences from more speakers including patients.
In 2021, I gave the first talk on kratom to a conference focused on cannabis and psychedelics. Based in the UK, the Global Cannabis Intelligence Summit was an opportunity to provide awareness about another plant medicine that was used by millions of people in the shadows. Psychedelic therapists and doctors knew nothing about kratom, and yet mainstream use of kratom was growing.
Dr. Michele Ross speaks on the science and health benefits of kratom at the Global Cannabis Intelligence Summit.
A Deep Dive into Kratom and Its Therapeutic Potential was the first time a kratom talk had been presented at a cannabis or psychedelic conference. It was a great opportunity to discuss how kratom works and comparing the number of kratom alkaloids to the number of cannabinoids in cannabis and how they are different. I also covered how kratom could be beneficial for pain management, substance abuse recovery, fatigue,
While the full hour long version of this talk as well as the rest of the Global Cannabis Intelligence (GCI) Summit was taken down by the GCI, an 8 minute trailer from the talk as well as a Professionally Cannabis Podcast on the topic of kratom remain up.
Want to learn more about kratom and how to use it? Read my book Kratom Is Medicine.
