“We cut family callback time from three hours to twenty minutes a day. Our nurses finally have time to focus on care.”
The challenge
With 142 residents and an average of 1.8 family contacts each, Sunrise Manor's nursing team was fielding 60+ inbound calls per day — most of them basic check-ins ("Did Mom take her medication today?", "Was Dad at lunch?").
Each call interrupted patient care. Charge nurses estimated 3 hours a day across the floor was being lost to phone tag. Family satisfaction surveys flagged "slow response time" as the #1 complaint two quarters running.
The solution
Daily auto-summaries
Tendara's family portal sends each authorized contact a one-line evening update — meals, vitals trend, mood, any flags — without any staff action.
Secure messaging instead of phone calls
Family questions route to the on-shift nurse via in-app message. Replies fit into natural pauses, not interruptions.
Visit-scheduling self-service
Families book their own visit slots, freeing up the front desk and reducing surprise drop-ins by 60%.
Care-conference invites with pre-read
Quarterly review materials (vitals, meds, goals) sent automatically 48 hours before each conference — meetings start on substance instead of catch-up.
The results
Within four weeks of the family portal going live, daily inbound call volume dropped from 60+ to under 10. Most remaining calls are genuine clinical questions, not status checks.
Charge nurses report 3.2 hours of recovered care time per week per nurse — the equivalent of half a shift returned to direct patient care across a 12-nurse team.
Family-satisfaction scores moved from 3.6/5 to 4.7/5 over the same quarter. "Communication" went from the lowest-scoring dimension to the highest.
Staff turnover declined too: exit interviews previously cited "administrative burden" 40% of the time; that's now down to 8%.
Implementation timeline
Week 0
Kickoff call + facility profile setup
Week 1
Resident import (142 records, 8 hours total)
Week 2
Family invitations sent — 94% activation by end of week
Week 3
Staff training + go-live for daily summaries
Week 4
Visit scheduling + care-conference automation enabled
Week 8
Full payback: time saved exceeds annual subscription