OHP Innovation Lab
At One Health Partners, curiosity, care and love of meaning drive our work. We believe innovation begins with critical reflection and receptive attunement to the connections that shape our lives — between people, animals, and the planet; between disciplines, systems, and stories.
Through our Innovation Lab, we are transforming the way we imagine, narrate, curate, integrate, and evaluate animal-assisted interventions and human–animal support services within health, education, and social care ecosystems — across the lifespan.
It’s a space for rethinking care: where research, reflective practice, and creative inquiry come together to generate new possibilities for inclusive, relational, and community-rooted well-being.
Our Approach
We understand health not just through a medical model, but as something relational, environmental, cultural, and collective. It is shaped not only by biology, neurobiology and physiology, but also by philosophy, religion, psychology, history, and the social conditions in which we live, learn, work, and connect.
We recognize the vital role of the social determinants of health — including housing, education, income, discrimination, social support, and access to care. These factors, along with cultural belonging and ecological context, profoundly influence both individual and community well-being.
Rooted in a One Health framework and inspired by a global vision of Health for All, we are committed to supporting more inclusive, compassionate, and creative systems of care.
We recognize the vital role of the social determinants of health — including housing, education, income, discrimination, social support, and access to care. These factors, along with cultural belonging and ecological context, profoundly influence both individual and community well-being.
Rooted in a One Health framework and inspired by a global vision of Health for All, we are committed to supporting more inclusive, compassionate, and creative systems of care.
How can we do justice to both our shared humanity and the depth of our differences — across species, cultures, and lived experience?
This guiding question animates everything we do.
It reflects our belief that health equity requires common purpose, deep respect for plurality, and a commitment to continuous learning — grounded in humility and curiosity in our encounters with each other.
A core part of our approach involves building bridges — between the arts, humanities, and social sciences, and the biomedical and life sciences. Within the biomedical and life sciences, we are committed to strengthening collaboration across the human, animal, and environmental research and professional communities — recognizing that these fields too often operate in silos, despite their interdependence.
It reflects our belief that health equity requires common purpose, deep respect for plurality, and a commitment to continuous learning — grounded in humility and curiosity in our encounters with each other.
A core part of our approach involves building bridges — between the arts, humanities, and social sciences, and the biomedical and life sciences. Within the biomedical and life sciences, we are committed to strengthening collaboration across the human, animal, and environmental research and professional communities — recognizing that these fields too often operate in silos, despite their interdependence.
We believe that meaningful change happens when scientific knowledge is paired with critical questioning, ethical imagination, cultural understanding, and relational care.
What Guides Our Work
Interdisciplinary Research
We draw on insights from a wide range of disciplines — including philosophy, sociology, anthropology, theology, biology, ecology, and law — as well as from literature, economics, health, education, creative practice, and diverse research traditions. This breadth of perspective helps spark new ways of seeing, understanding, and acting.
Relational Care
We center care, connection, and trust — recognizing that healing happens in relationship, not in isolation.
Creative Imagination
We explore how the human-animal bond, music, and the arts can cross divides and create shared spaces of meaning, belonging, and transformation.
Inclusive Community
We support systems that are attuned to disability, neurodiversity, cultural and ecological difference, and the need for care that is accessible, equitable, and just.
Collaborative Commitment
We work across disciplines, sectors, and communities to reimagine how health is understood, supported, and experienced — in hospitals, community organizations, public institutions, workplaces, schools, libraries, homes, and everyday life.
Join Us in Creating Change
Want to Collaborate?
We welcome partnerships with researchers, practitioners, educators, artists, musicians, health leaders, organizations and community members who share our commitment to the co-creation of worlds of meaning, healing and hope. Whether you're curious about a shared project, co-authoring a study, or applying a new idea in practice — we’d love to hear from you.
Contact Us at innovation@onehealthpartners.org or reach out to Heidi Libesman at hlibesman@onehealthpartners.org
Areas of Interest and Research
Our research spans disciplines and communities, with a focus on practices that advance integrative approaches to health, holistic care, inclusion, equity, and systems change. Areas of particular interest include research and pilot projects that contribute to exploring and understanding the impact and value of:
One Health approaches to health, education and social care
Animal assisted therapy, activities and interventions
The neurobiology of therapeutic human–animal interaction
Music and animal-assisted therapy as complementary therapies
Polyvagal theory
Social innovation through animal-assisted interventions
Animal-assisted literacy and social-emotional learning
Animal-assisted therapy and trauma-informed care
Mental Health and Well-Being across the life-span
Aging in place
Social isolation and Loneliness
Inclusive program design: Disability, dementia and neurodiversity friendly arts, music, library and school programs
Physican Wellness
Workplace Wellness
Recreation Therapy
One Health Humanities Initiatives
Veterinary Social Work
Access to veterinary care and human–animal support services as social determinants of human health and well-being