Staves Occupational Therapy Services is now officially The Nurturing Nest Collective.
Along with new branding, the group is moving to a new office in the coming weeks.
Owner Chassidy Staves said in order to reflect their more well-rounded offerings of therapy and feeding services available, moving offices and changing the name at the same time felt right.
“When we opened at our current location over a year ago with just one treatment room, the vision I had to make a difference in the lives of local families by providing comprehensive feeding therapy services was big,” she said. “I started very small — it was just me. I had two people on a waitlist. This has grown bigger than I anticipated and much faster than I thought.”
Staves Occupational Therapy Services first opened in November 2019. After her office opened back up and she started seeing patients under the new COVID-19 guidelines, Staves was even busier then than before.
“I have spent a lot of time setting aside visits to educate families on normal feeding development and providing a lot of resources for families,” she said.
The name change to The Nurturing Nest Collective is official, though there are still a few finishing touches that need to be made before the move is complete.
With the move, Staves will be expanding from one treatment room to six. But she is staying in the same building — Building C at The Springs, 2200 East Parrish Avenue — just moving up two floors.
The Nurturing Nest Collective provides feeding therapy and lactation services for families in the local community. Lactation evaluations, feeding therapy, oral motor therapy, are provided, as well as TummyTime! consultations.
With the bigger space, Staves will be able to serve more families, as well as offer more services and disciplines — further allowing their feeding clinic to provide Owensboro something unique.
“I would not have been in the position to move into a larger office space and start to add additional therapists without all of the support I have received in the first year of business,” Staves said. “My goal with the move to a larger space is to be able to increase the therapy services provided in order to provide a more comprehensive feeding team as well as to host TummyTime! classes once group classes are safe again.”
Staves has always worked in pediatrics, but she said the more she worked with young children — particularly infants — the more questions she got about feeding and kids having trouble eating, such as the transition to solids, having trouble breastfeeding, and reflux.
“Parents always asked but never really knew where to turn for help,” Staves said. “A lot of parents said they felt like they were struggling with these skills.”
Staves continued to educate herself on the subject, and even went through some of the same issues with her own son.
“I just realized that was so much help out there in other places that we didn’t have in Owensboro,” she said. “There wasn’t an overall encompassing ability to help parents how to help their kids feeds when they are not doing that on their own. … I’ve had patients go out of town for help. (I thought) let’s figure how to make that happen here in Owensboro for families.”
By Ryan Richardson The Owensboro Times