Serving Clients With Clinical Expertise and a Little Horse Magic

Growing up around horses planted a seed in Kelsey Herman OT ’19.

That seed sprouted into a business idea while she was in occupational therapy school at Pacific University, and it eventually blossomed as Healing Steps - Equine Centered Therapy just north of Vancouver, Washington.

Started two years after Herman graduated from Pacific as a doctor of occupational therapy, Healing Steps combines her lifelong love of horses with her dedication to the purpose of serving her community through occupational therapy. At the stable, she provides a unique environment to help clients develop skills that improve their quality of life. 

“The cool thing about OT is our emphasis on function. Sometimes that means, ‘I want to be able to take care of my dogs better.’ Sometimes that means, ‘I want to be able to take care of my grandchildren.’ Sometimes that means, ‘I need to be able to focus in school better.’ Whatever is meaningful and important to that person, OT gets to work on.”

Herman and staff at Healing Steps — including fellow Pacific alumna Bre Davis-Shoemaker ’16, OT ’19 — serve patients who may be living with autism, Down syndrome, learning disabilities, developmental delays or any other diagnoses that affect their day-to-day activities. Working with horses allows for dynamic treatment including balance, endurance, coordination and postural control.

“What makes using horses in OT different is that it’s truly just our tool,” Herman said. “In a clinical setting, I might use a treadmill, or a ball or a swing or a bolster. But here the horse is all those things.”

The horses, Herman says, bring a little extra, too.

“About 85% of the use of the horse I can explain with science. I can explain how it impacts the nervous system. I can explain how it helps the sensory systems. But what I can’t explain is that little bit of horse magic.”