Our Team
Danielle Braun Kauffman
Co-Director and Program Developer, Group facilitator
Danielle Braun-Kauffman has been a registered clinical counsellor and clinical supervisor for nearly 2 decades. She has taught and been clinical supervisor through Trinity Western Univeristy’s MFT program. She owns and runs an integrative therapeutic clinic named RePose Therapy in Abbotsford BC, that specializes in working with children, families, and individuals with trauma through a somatic and relational therapeutic lens . As a therapist and supervisor she specializes in working with complex attachment trauma, and psychedelic preparation and integration. She has been trained in psychedelic work through Therapsil, Polaris, Roots to Thrive and MAPS (Multi-disciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies).
When she is not immersed in this therapeutic work, you will find her exploring BC’s mountain tops and ocean shores with her partner and three children.
Hillary McBride
Co-Director and Program Developer, Group facilitator
Dr. Hillary McBride is a registered psychologist, a researcher, and podcastor, with expertise that includes working with trauma and trauma therapies, embodiment, and the intersection of spirituality and mental health. Her first book, Mothers, Daughters, and Body Image: Learning to Love Ourselves as We Are, was published in 2017; she was the senior editor of the textbook Embodiment and Eating Disorders: Theory, Research, Prevention, and Treatment, which was published in 2018. Her most recent bestselling book The Wisdom of Your Body: Finding wholeness, healing and connection through embodied living came out in the fall of 2021. She has been recognized by the American Psychological Association, and the Canadian Psychological Association for her research and clinical work. In addition to being a teaching faculty at a number of universities around BC she is an ambassador for Sanctuary Mental Health, and the host of CBC's award winning podcast Other People's Problems. Hillary makes her home on the land of the lək̓ʷəŋən People, known today as the Esquimalt and Songhees Nations, and you can often find her near or in the ocean.
Listen to Dr McBride talk about her own Psychedelic experiences and the Katalyst program on the podcast “Back From The Abyss”:
Reg Peters
Dr. Reg Peters has been a physician for over 25 years, specializing in emergency, trauma and family medicine. He is a UBC clinical assistant professor and played a fundamental role in the establishment of the UBC Abbotsford Family Practice Residency program. He holds specialty training in sports medicine and has worked with many professional sports teams including the Canadian National soccer team and the Canucks organization. After years of treating illness and injury, Reg began to focus on prevention. He developed a passion for integrative wellness with a focus on mental health and psychedelic therapies. He has expertise in ketamine administration and has completed a certification with the Ketamine Training Center under Dr Phil Wolfson and received training from the Roots to Thrive program. He is a medical consultant with Therapsil and is one of the first physicians in the country to have received a special exemption from Health Canada to administer psilocybin. He is currently the Primary Investigator in a Health Canada approved trial using psilocybin.
In his free time he is training his new puppy.
Medical Director and Team Physician
Lianne Bjornerud
Lianne Bjornerud is a Nurse Practitioner with a focus on Refugee, First Nation, and women’s health. With nearly 20 years of medical experience and a Master of Public Health degree, Lianne has a deep understanding of the multiple factors that affect the health of individuals and communities. She has a growing passion for the safe use of psychedelic medicine in mental health care and is trained in ketamine therapy through Roots to Thrive and Fluence.
When she’s not working in health care, you can find her exploring BC's mountain trails with her husband and two dogs.
Team Nurse Practitioner
Eyerusalem Abebe
Eyerusalem was born in East Africa to people who were artisans, farmers and blacksmiths, making tools and molding clay, imagining new possibilities of what could be born from melding iron with fire and earth with water. She has lived across three continents and currently finds herself planted on the ancestral, traditional and unceded territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh peoples. Eyerusalem values working toward a world where everyone can trust and embody the knowing that they are innately worthy. She has a BA in Global Development and has over five years experience in international non-profit management. She has also worked as a community developer and educator in the Fraser Valley focusing on diversity, inclusion and anti-oppression. She has training from Roots to Thrive in Ketamine-assisted therapy and group program, and currently provides group facilitation, medicine session support, and program navigation for Katalyst and Upstream clinic. Dedicated to her own growth and learning, and that of those around her, she is starting her masters in counselling program to become a registered clinical counsellor.
Program Operation Manager and Group facilitator
Winchester Victor
Group Facilitation Support
Winchester is from the Cheam First Nation in Rosedale BC. He works doing somatic trauma therapy at Cheam as well as at Sto:lo Nation in Chilliwack. His training is ongoing and is built on a foundation of cultural healing training, registered massage therapy, and some more specific somatic therapy approaches. He is currently on the path to becoming registered as a clinical counselor. He is very passionate about empowering people to let the instinctive healing processes of the body heal them. The goal is to safely give stuck survival energy a pathway out of the body. Ultimately he hopes to see this “bottom-up”, body based ability spread out from individuals into families, communities and mainstream culture.
It is his pleasure to learn and grow with the Katalyst team. He is often participating in ceremony, making art and leatherwork, and spending time by the river.
Ryan Newman
Ryan is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with an MA in Counselling Psychology from Trinity Western University. He finds within himself an incessant longing to better understand what it means to be human, which has led him to pursue training in therapy models that are non-pathologizing, compassionate, and deeply relational. He is inspired by all aspects of the journey of becoming human, and considers psychedelic medicine to be an invaluable tool in this process. He resides primarily on the traditional lands of the Coast Salish peoples, specifically the Katzie, Kwantlen, Matsqui, and Semiahmoo First Nations.
In his free time Ryan can be found playing board games, riding roller coasters, making music, or searching for a new hobby to explore.
Group Facilitator