Innovative Occupational Therapy Services

10/01/2026

Great day collaborating with the team at Cortellucci Vaughan Hospital – Mackenzie Health! 🏥✨

We were proud to share education on hospital discharge navigation and help ensure patients and families have a smoother transition from hospital to home. Thank you to the team for their warm welcome and commitment to patient care! 💙

09/18/2026

09/15/2026

🏥 Take a tour of our St. Catharines clinic! ✨
Located inside Marotta Family Hospital, our occupational therapy clinic is designed to support clients of all ages, with a special focus on helping children thrive.
So, what is pediatric occupational therapy? 🌟 It's a type of therapy that helps children build the skills they need for everyday life — from fine motor skills like handwriting and cutting, to sensory regulation, self-care routines, social skills, and overall confidence. Our goal is to meet each child where they're at and help them succeed at home, at school, and in the community.
Here's a look inside our space:
🧑‍🤝‍🧑 Teen Room — a dedicated, comfortable space designed with our teen clients in mind
💬 Counselling Room — a private, calming space for therapeutic conversations
🌈 Sensory Room — built to support sensory regulation, exploration, and self-regulation strategies
🧩 Pediatric Treatment Rooms — purpose-built spaces where our youngest clients can learn, play, and grow
We're proud to offer a warm, welcoming environment for the whole family right here in St. Catharines! If you're curious about how occupational therapy could support your child, we'd love to chat. 💙
📞 289-214-4467 | 🌐 www.innovativeot.com

09/11/2026

Some of the best OT work doesn't look like "therapy" at all. 💙
Today's session was all about building confidence and emotional regulation — something this sweet kiddo has been working hard on lately. So instead of a worksheet, we hit the wall with markers for an "I am..." activity, where he got to identify and write down good things about himself.
Why this works:
🧠 Emotional regulation: Big arm movements and standing to write engage the whole body, which helps regulate the nervous system. It's a gentle, active way to work through big feelings before (or instead of) sitting still and "talking it out."
💗 Confidence: Naming positive qualities about yourself is a skill — it doesn't always come naturally, especially for kids who are hard on themselves. Practicing it out loud and in writing helps it start to feel true.
✍️ Bonus fine & gross motor benefits: Vertical surface writing builds shoulder stability and wrist control, which support handwriting — but here, that was just a happy side effect, not the point.
For parents:
If your child struggles with confidence or big emotions, try this at home! Grab a whiteboard, a mirror, or even just paper on the fridge, and ask: "What's one good thing about you today?" Keep it low-pressure and let them lead. Sometimes the smallest prompts open up the biggest conversations.
Proud of this kiddo today. 🌟

09/10/2026

Climbing walls aren't just fun — they're a full-body OT workout! 🧗‍♂️💪
In this session we're targeting:
🔹 Bilateral coordination – reciprocal arm/leg patterns while climbing
🔹 Motor planning (praxis) – sequencing each hand/foot placement
🔹 UE strength & shoulder stability – weight-bearing to reach and pull
🔹 Core/trunk strength – stabilizing the body against the wall
🔹 Grip strength & visual-motor integration – gripping holds and judging reach distance
Climbing is one of our favorite "heavy work" activities! Heavy work means pushing, pulling, lifting, or climbing against resistance — it sends strong input to the muscles and joints that has a powerful regulating effect on the nervous system. 🧠
For kids who are anxious or overstimulated, heavy work can be calming. For kids who seem sluggish or unfocused, it can be alerting. Either way, it helps build body awareness, supports attention, and leaves kids more regulated and ready to learn. That's why we love building it into sessions — it's fun AND it's doing real work! 🌟

09/09/2026

Renee is a bilingual Occupational Therapist in good standing with the College of Occupational Therapists of Ontario. She earned her degree in Occupational Therapy from the University of Ottawa in 2002, following an undergraduate degree in Human Kinetics, and brings over 23 years of experience providing occupational therapy and case management services to adults and adolescents with complex medical needs.

Renee has extensive experience supporting individuals with mental health diagnoses, neurological disorders, and orthopaedic and musculoskeletal injuries, with particular expertise in traumatic brain injury and cognitive rehabilitation, concussion management, complex orthopaedic and musculoskeletal injuries, chronic pain, and mental health. She has gained specialized expertise in brain injury rehabilitation and the management of mental health disorders, including the facilitation of group-based therapy.

Renee has worked across a variety of sectors, including Auto Insurance, Long Term Disability, WSIB, Veterans Affairs Canada, and the Department of National Defence, as well as within the hospital public health care system. Her expertise includes in-home functional and attendant care assessments, hospital discharge planning, assessment and treatment of catastrophic injuries, case management, and home adaptation and modification.

Renee holds a range of specialized certifications, including MoCA Administration Certification, Non-Violent Crisis Intervention, Applied Su***de Intervention Skills (ASIST), Motivational Interviewing (Level 1), Ontario Brain Injury Association Level 2: Neurobehavioural Disorders, and Dialectical Behavioural Therapy (DBT) Certification in Group Facilitation. She values lifelong learning and continuing professional education, and is fluent in both English and French.

With a client-centered approach and a commitment to lifelong learning, Renee empowers her clients to overcome complex challenges and achieve their maximum potential in daily living, recovery, and community participation.

Welcome to the team Renee!

09/09/2026

🧠✋ Meet our Sensory Regulation Wall!
This isn't just decoration — it's a functional tool we use every day in pediatric occupational therapy. Walls like this give kids a hands-on way to:
🌈 Practice self-regulation with the "hold and breathe" buttons
✋ Build fine motor & visual-motor skills with finger tracing paths
🔢 Work on letter and number recognition while moving their whole body
🧘 Calm their nervous system through proprioceptive input (pressing, reaching, tracing)
For many of our kiddos, regulation isn't something that "just happens" — it's a skill we build together, one deep breath at a time. Watching them move through this wall independently is one of our favorite parts of the day!
💙 Have questions about sensory tools for your child? Send us a message — we'd love to help.

09/04/2026

🌟 Motor Planning + Midline Crossing in Action! 🌟

This little one came to us with some common (but very fixable!) challenges: reaching across the body to get dressed, buckling a seatbelt, buttoning/zipping, and keeping handwriting on the line ✍️

His school also noticed he was avoiding crossing midline — swapping items hand-to-hand instead of reaching across his body — along with fine motor delays (pencil grasp, pincer grasp) and difficulty with motor planning & sequencing.

09/04/2026

Hana brings nearly a decade of experience as an Occupational Therapist, specializing in pediatric care since 2017. She works with children and adolescents across community programs, public schools, and outpatient clinics, focusing on trauma-informed care, school-based OT, and handwriting intervention.

Hana supports children with developmental, sensory, and mental health needs, using standardized assessments like the McMaster Handwriting Assessment, Beery VMI, Movement ABC, Sensory Profile 2, and Primitive Reflex Integration to guide evidence-based, individualized care.

She takes a collaborative, strengths-based approach—partnering closely with children, families, and school teams to help kids build skills, confidence, and meaningful participation in everyday life.

Hana holds a Doctor of Occupational Therapy from MGH Institute of Health Professions (2017) and is a member in good standing with the College of Occupational Therapists of Ontario.

09/03/2026

Feelings check-in, spin edition! 🎡 #
Emotional regulation starts with emotional vocabulary — and this "Today I'm Feeling" wheel makes identifying feelings fun, visual, and low-pressure for our littles.
In pediatric OT, emotional regulation is a huge part of what we work on. Before a child can manage big feelings, they first need to recognize and name them — that's where tools like this come in! We use visual supports like this wheel to help kids build the self-awareness that's the foundation for coping strategies, sensory regulation techniques, and eventually, independent emotional regulation in everyday life.
Instead of asking "how do you feel?" (which can be a hard question for kids to answer on the spot), a spin takes the pressure off and opens the door to conversation. Today's spin landed on PROUD 🌟 — perfect chance to talk about what made them feel that way!
This simple tool supports:
✨ Emotional literacy & vocabulary building
✨ Self-awareness as a foundation for self-regulation
✨ Connecting feelings to the body (what does "proud" feel like inside?)
✨ A safe, playful way to check in
Little tools, big impact. 💛