How to Maximize Your PR Impact at HLTH 2026
Every November, healthcare's most influential buyers, executives, and journalists converge on Las Vegas for HLTH USA. The 2026 edition will run November 15–18 at The Venetian Expo Center, where over 12,250 attendees, 4,400 C-suite executives, and 150 media outlets will be present.. That’s not just a trade show. That’s a purpose-built platform for spreading your message to the furthest corners of the industry.
Journalists go to HLTH expecting to be pitched. They show up looking for stories, for announcements to cover and thought leaders to interview. The trouble, of course, is that hundreds of voices are competing for the same attention. Standing out above the crowd is a matter of making your story the effortless and obvious choice.
What follows is a practical guide to making your HLTH presence count through organic media coverage.
The Product Launch
A conference like HLTH is an ideal launch vehicle. Many journalists come with the sole intent of making in-depth reports on the industry’s latest products. But at an event of this magnitude, no journalist walks from exhibit to exhibit hoping they’ll stumble upon a product to cover. They plan out their stories months in advance. By the time they arrive, they know what they’re looking for. The rest is just noise.
That’s why you start with the release. A good product launch release covers the basics: what the product is, who it's for, what problem it solves. But it has to do more than just inform. Journalists don’t write ads or instruction manuals; they write stories. Frame the value proposition within a broader narrative. What are people worried about, excited about, or unsure about?
In 2026, this is not difficult: AI adoption pressure, rising costs, the unresolved question of who pays for what, etc. Make the problem vivid and specific, then show exactly how your solution addresses it. Include a substantive quote from a company leader.
Once the release is ready, share it with journalists under embargo weeks before the conference. This gives them time to evaluate the newsworthiness of your offering and incorporate your exhibit into their schedule. You should also make your spokesperson available pre-conference so that you don’t compete with every other spokesperson for an interview slot. Have high-quality visual assets ready, and if your product lends itself to a demo, be sure to have it on-site.
Thought Leadership
If you don’t have a product to launch, you still have a story to tell. Journalists are often just as interested in the ideas behind the innovations as they are in the innovations themselves.
HLTH 2026 is organized around a pointed theme: "The Age of Intelligent Health is Here. Buckle Up!" The program is built around a specific and contested premise: AI is reshaping healthcare in fundamental ways, and the industry hasn't decided what that demands. Every track on the agenda runs through that question, from behavioral health and employer-sponsored care to GLP-1s and cardiometabolic health.
This is an opening for companies without a product announcement. If your team has a genuine point of view on where intelligent health is heading—where adoption is moving too fast, where the clinical value actually lies, etc.—journalists covering HLTH will be interested to hear your take. Your spokesperson doesn't need to be launching something to be useful to a reporter on deadline. They need to be specific, credible, and available.
Pitch before the show, with a clear statement of what your expert can credibly address. If there is no concrete news peg, most journalists will prefer to meet at the conference rather than take a pre-show call. That's fine. Pitch anyway, so they know to look for you when they arrive.
Nailing the Interview
Whether you’re launching a product, running a thought-leadership campaign, or both, you’ll need to be prepared for interviews.
Spokespeople must know the problem your solution addresses and be ready to articulate it. Anticipate the questions you hope the journalist doesn't ask, and prepare answers for those first. Someone from your PR team can staff the interview, but their role is last resort, not copilot. And if you promise to follow up with additional information, always deliver it by the time you said you would. Reporters remember.
Bottom Line
The medtech companies that earn coverage at HLTH are not always the ones with the flashiest products. They are the ones who tell the most compelling stories, and who make it easy for the media to retell those stories. Simply making the effort to meet journalists halfway will put your company head and shoulders above the competition.
Be sure to check out our other blogs on useful and interesting public relations topics, like why most PR firms will waste your money.