All guides

For care homes and hospitals

You manage DrBell for your residents from a browser at org.drbell.app. Nothing needs installing, and it works on the office computer, the ward tablet and a phone.

The console has six tabs: Residents, Staff, Rota, Handover, Licences & billing and Settings. Your name for the home, its type and your role are at the top, with Your account and Sign out.

Getting started

From nothing to the first round, in this order:

1. Talk to us first. org.drbell.app opens on "DrBell for organisations"

with examples of what an organisation can do and a Talk to us button to the contact page at drbell.app/legal/contact. We agree the seats and who needs access, then send you your start link. (When DrBell switches self-registration on, the page goes straight to sign-in instead.)

1. Open your start link and sign in with **Continue with your phone

number, then the six-digit code. Register a new organisation — the home's name, a short name, the type — and Register. You are its owner. (A colleague your manager invited, or anyone whose organisation is already set up, uses Sign in** under "Already set up, or invited by your manager?" on the first page.)

1. Wait for approval. DrBell approves the home (we aim for one working

day) and agrees your contracted seats with you — see The care-home plan. Until then the console says "awaiting approval" and holds no residents.

1. Settings — when caregivers are told, and how the home appears.
2. Staff — ask each colleague to install the DrBell app and sign in once,

then Invite a colleague by their number. They sign in at org.drbell.app and Accept.

1. Residents → Add a resident, or Import a list for many at once.
2. Enter their medicines — Read it, check the sentence against the

slip, Add this medicine. Add the strip photos when you can.

1. Rota — + Add a shift for each shift you run, then **Put somebody

on** for today.

1. Handover at each change of shift. Staff record each dose given in the

DrBell app, where the residents they can see appear in the row of names.

1. Register the organisation

<!-- org:register -->

Open org.drbell.app and choose Continue with your phone number. The same button creates your account — there is no separate sign-up. You will be sent a six-digit code. (Email, Google or Apple are there too when DrBell has them switched on.)

Signed in with no organisation yet, you are offered Register a new organisation. Nothing is charged. You need:

• the home's name as you want residents' families to see it
• a short name for links (filled in for you; change it if you like)
• the type — care home, hospital, clinic, home-care team, pharmacy, or

something else

• a contact email, if you like, so we can reach you about the approval

Your organisation starts as "awaiting approval" and cannot hold a single resident record until somebody at DrBell approves it. That is deliberate: "we are a care home" is a claim about the real world, and no software can check it. We aim to approve within one working day. If it is urgent, write to hello@drbell.app.

Whoever registers is the owner. Invited to somebody else's home instead? The invitation is on the same page, with Accept. If you belong to more than one home, a list at the top switches between them.

2. Admit residents

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Residents → Add a resident (owners and admins).

Edit corrects any of it later — a room after a move, a language chosen wrongly at admission. It also holds the resident's other times of the day besides the home's meals — Evening tea, After physio — up to six. + Add a time and Add; change one and Save; Delete. Each is saved on its own, straight away. A medicine tied to one (set up from the phone app) rings before, with or after it like a meal, and moves when the time moves. Deleting one that medicines are tied to asks whether they move to another time or keep their clock times.

Remove erases the resident: their medications, schedules, every recorded dose, prescriptions and photographs. It cannot be undone, and you are asked to type their name, then press Erase this resident. It frees a contracted seat immediately, so a resident who has left should be removed (or discharged, below) rather than left in place — otherwise the seat stays in use and you may not be able to admit the person in that bed.

The header reads Residents (1 of 5): how many you have, and how many you contracted. At the limit, Add a resident is greyed out: "Every contracted seat is in use".

Each row has Medicines, Appointments, Edit, Discharge and Remove for owners and admins. Staff and clinicians open a resident's medicines by clicking the row. Search by name or room at the top.

Appointments

Appointments on a resident's row holds their hospital and clinic visits: Add an appointment — doctor, lab test, procedure or other; what it is; the date and, if known, the time; who and where; notes; and Remind this many days before (1 unless you change it). Add it. Once the day comes, mark it Attended or Missed; Cancelled any time. Include past shows the old ones.

Discharge, and records moving between a home and a family

Discharge hands a resident's record back to a family member, for example when they go home. Choose who under Hand it to — only somebody who already has access to the record; invite the family member as a caregiver first if there is nobody — add why if you like (they see it), and Propose the discharge. Nothing moves until they accept; then the record is theirs, on their own family's plan, and the seat is freed.

A record waiting to move to or from your home shows above the residents ("A record is waiting to move"), with Approve or Decline. Reminders keep ringing throughout.

3. Enter their medicines

This is the part that makes the rest work. Until a resident has medicines, nothing is ever due and the rota has nothing to show.

Residents → click the resident, or press Medicines.

Add a medicine:

Then press Read it. DrBell shows you what it understood, in a sentence:

1 tablet at breakfast, 1 tablet at dinner after food

Check that sentence against the slip before pressing Add this medicine. DrBell will not save until you have pressed Read it, because guessing about a dose is not an acceptable mistake. If it says "some of this was assumed", it filled in something the prescriber did not write — read it twice. Which days? covers what the shorthand cannot: some weekdays, every other day, every few days, or days on and a break.

Shorthand it understands:

Tick Critical for the ones where a late dose matters — the ones your doctor said must never be missed. A critical dose that is not taken is told about after 15 minutes instead of 30 (unless your policy sets other times), and every skip or Later on it is told too.

Adding, stopping and counting medicines is for owners and admins.

When the doctor changes how long

The Course column says until a medicine's last day, or no end. When the doctor extends a course, shortens it, or says to carry on, press it: choose the new last day (it is included, and cannot be before today — to end it now, stop the medicine) or No end — until the doctor says to stop, note what the doctor said if you like, and Record the change. Future reminders are rebuilt; what was given is kept; the change is in the audit log with your name.

In the drawer

The In the drawer column counts what is left: "There are this many left", or "I bought this many more", and Warn when this many days are left. Save. Every dose given counts down by itself, and DrBell warns before it runs out.

Admitting several at once

Import a list, on the Residents tab. A care home arriving with forty residents already in a spreadsheet should not type them in one at a time.

Choose a CSV file, Download the template, or paste rows straight in. Column names are matched generously — name, resident name and Full Name all work, and a Language column may say "Telugu" rather than a code.

Check the file first. Nothing is created until you press Admit [n] residents: you see every line, what will happen to it, and why anything is being skipped. Columns nothing was read from are named, so a Room No. that DrBell did not recognise shows up before every room ends up blank rather than after.

The photograph

This is the part residents actually notice. + photo on any medicine, or the photo fields when you add one, attaches a picture of the strip — and that picture appears on the reminder itself, so the person can check what is in their hand against what is on the screen.

Photograph the strip as it looks in the drawer, not the box front. JPEG, PNG, WebP or HEIC, up to 12MB; a phone photo is 2–5MB.

You can also attach the prescription. That is kept with the record under Prescriptions (with Remove) and is never shown on a reminder.

Most homes add the photo later, from the table, because the slip is in one hand when the medicine is typed and the box is in a drawer down the corridor. That is expected — the medicine works without it, and the picture can be added any time.

Stop ends future reminders. It does not erase anything: the medicine and every dose already recorded stay in the record, because "was she on it in March?" is a question a home has to be able to answer.

4. Staff

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Staff → Invite a colleague (owners and admins; others are told only an owner or admin can see the list). You need their mobile number in international form (+91…), and they must already have a DrBell account — staff on a system holding medical records are not conjured from a typed phone number. Ask them to install the app and sign in once first. Choose their role and Send invitation. They open org.drbell.app, sign in with that number and Accept; until then they see nothing, and the list says "Not yet accepted".

Confining someone to a ward

Change → Confine to specific residents. This is the setting worth getting right. Left off, that person sees every resident the organisation holds — and a new colleague starts that way. The "Sees" column says which is in force on every row, so a mistake is visible without opening anything.

A scope with nothing ticked shows No residents assigned in amber. That is a valid way to suspend somebody without removing them — but it is rarely what was meant, which is why it is amber and not green.

Remove ends their access immediately, everywhere (End their access). Doses they already recorded keep their name on them. Nothing is erased, and you can invite them back.

5. The rota

<!-- org:rota -->

Rota answers two questions that get asked minutes apart: who is on today, and what is still outstanding right now. Owners, admins, staff and clinicians can read it; owners and admins change it.

First define the shifts this home actually runs — + Add a shift. Name it whatever your handover calls it: Early, Late, Nights. If the end time is before the start, tick This shift runs past midnight into the next day. Answer it honestly rather than letting software guess: guessing wrong puts the shift on the wrong day. Retire a shift you no longer run.

Then pick the day (Back to today returns), Put somebody on a shift, and tick which residents they are responsible for. Only colleagues who have accepted their invitation can be put on. Remove (Take them off) takes somebody off that day.

Being on the rota is not access. Ward scope decides what a nurse may see; the rota decides what she is responsible for today. Changing the rota never grants or removes access to a record.

Who is told when a dose is late or missed

Every owner, admin and member of staff who can see the resident — their ward scope applies — is told when one of the home's residents is running late or has missed a dose: in the app, and for a missed dose by WhatsApp or SMS too, wherever DrBell has those switched on. Clinicians and billing staff are not. Family you have invited are told as well, as they choose. The timings are the home's own, under Settings.

The rota comes first. If somebody is on shift right now and has this resident ticked for that shift, only they are told — the rest of the team is left in peace. If nobody is (no rota for today, a gap between shifts, or the person on shift cannot see this resident's ward), everyone above is told. A rota can narrow who hears; it can never mean nobody does. Shift times are read in the home's own time zone, and a night shift that runs past midnight counts until it ends the next morning.

On shift right now is at the top of today's rota, because that is why somebody opened this at 08:15. It lists whoever is on at this minute — a night shift that started yesterday counts until it ends — with when their shift ends, and under each, the doses due in their shift that are still not recorded: the resident, the room, the medicine, and whether the window has closed. If nobody is on, it says so, because that means a missed dose goes to everyone. Times are the home's own.

6. The handover

<!-- org:handover -->

Handover is what one nurse hands to the next: what is still owed from the shift ending, and what falls due during the shift beginning.

It is a worklist, not a report, and the order is the point:

• Still owed from the last shift comes first — oldest first, with

criticals ahead of ordinary medicines of the same age.

• Then each round, grouped by time, walked in room order — 9A before

10A, so nobody crosses the building twice.

Each line is room, resident, medicine, dose and food instruction, because that is what somebody standing at a door needs and nothing else is. At the top, the counts: residents, outstanding, critical, due and given.

Pick Next 4h / 8h / 12h to match your shift, and Print if the round is walked with paper. If the list is longer than one screen can hold it says so rather than stopping quietly — shorten the window to see all of it.

A dose due just before the shift started, whose window is still open, appears in the coming round rather than vanishing. The outgoing nurse did not get to it, it is still givable, and the boundary means nothing to the resident.

7. Seats and billing

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Licences & billing (owners, admins and billing staff) shows how many seats you contracted and how many are in use. One resident whose record the home holds is one seat; a resident whose family keeps the record does not use one. Removing or discharging a resident frees one immediately. Raising the limit needs DrBell — write to hello@drbell.app with the subject "More seats"; it takes effect at once.

The same page explains how your staff sign in, and shows the home's Subscription — plan, status, contracted seats and renewal date — once DrBell has set it up (see The care-home plan).

If DrBell suspends your organisation — over a billing dispute, for example — reminders for existing residents keep firing, and staff are still told. A commercial argument must never stop somebody being told to take their medicine. While suspended, no resident can be added or imported.

The care-home plan

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A care home is on DrBell's organisation plan. It is not sold in the app stores or on the website: it is a contract with DrBell, per resident, agreed for a year. Write to hello@drbell.app to agree one; the seat count comes from it.

What it includes:

• every resident and every carer — no limit on the staff, family or

phones around a resident; only the number of residents is bounded, by your seats;

• the home's tools — ward scope, the rota, the handover, importing

residents, appointments, your own branding, and sending events to your own systems;

• families told as on Plus — a resident's family, once invited, is told

about late and missed doses in the app, and by WhatsApp, SMS or email where DrBell has those working, even if their own account is on Free;

• push alerts, refill and appointment notices and diet reminders, which

are paid features on a family's plan and are on for every resident of the home; the home's staff are always told, on the home's plan;

• a person answers your email.

No plan, this one included, makes phone calls.

After you pay, and if you stop

After the contract is agreed, DrBell sets your seats and the Subscription on Licences & billing: plan, status, contracted seats and when it renews. Invoices come from DrBell under the contract, not from this console; the console holds no prices or card details. "No subscription on file" means DrBell has not set it up yet — the seats still work.

Need more seats? Write to hello@drbell.app; the new limit applies at once. Fewer residents? Remove or discharge them; each frees a seat.

If you stop using DrBell, first decide where each resident's record goes:

• Discharge it to a family member who should keep it. It moves to their

own family's plan — on Free, nobody in the family is told about doses any more, DrBell sends no notifications (the alarm still rings on the person's phone), and diet reminders are kept but stop ringing until the family has Plus.

• Or Settings → Erase this organisation (owner only), which deletes every

resident's record the home holds. Export anything you must keep first.

Families who look after somebody through their own DrBell account keep that account either way.

Your account

Your account, in the top right of every console (in the left rail on admin), is where you set:

• Your name — what colleagues and family see instead of your phone number.

Until you set one, screens show the number, because that is genuinely all DrBell knows about you.

• Your language — what DrBell says to you. Medicine names are never

translated.

• Your timezone — used for your quiet hours, when alerts to you are held

back. It does not change anybody's reminders, or the times you see: a resident's 8am tablet stays at their 8am, on their clock.

It also lists where you are signed in, with Sign out everywhere else; Download everything DrBell holds about you; and Delete my account.

Adding an email address

Optional, and it does not replace your mobile number — it adds a second way in, for people who would rather use email. Enter the address, and a six-digit code confirms it. You can remove either one, but never the last way you have to sign in.

The code arrives by email within a minute, from DrBell. Not there? Check spam, then ask for a new code. If the email service is ever down, the screen says plainly that no code was sent, rather than leaving you refreshing an empty inbox.

Passkeys

A passkey lets a person sign in with the device's own fingerprint, face or screen lock instead of a code. Under Your account → How you sign in → Passkeys the console says whether it is available, and a code always still works.

Off until your organisation turns it on. On a ward's shared tablet, a passkey saved there lets anyone who knows the tablet's screen lock sign in as that staff member. So staff can add a passkey on this console only when your organisation has asked DrBell to turn passkeys on for it; until then the section says "Your organisation has not turned passkeys on for this console. Ask your organisation admin." (Email hello@drbell.app to ask.) Someone who already has a passkey from care.drbell.app can still sign in with it here, and can remove it.

• Turn it on only if everybody signs in on a device of their own, protected

by a screen lock.

• Staff who leave: Remove (End their access) as always. They can no

longer open your organisation's console, whatever they sign in with.

• Lost a phone? Sign in with a code, then **Your account → Passkeys →

Remove** the lost phone's passkey.

Questions

A nurse says she cannot see a resident. Check her ward scope under Staff → Change, not the rota. And check she pressed Accept on org.drbell.app.

Nothing appears on the rota's outstanding list. Either nobody is rostered for today, or the residents have no medicines entered yet. Check section 3.

Can we import residents from a spreadsheet? Yes — Residents → Import a list. Download the template or paste rows; you see what will be added before anything is saved.

Does DrBell tell families anything? Only if the resident's family has been given access, and only while Families can be invited is on under Settings. Then they are told about late and missed doses on the home's plan. Your staff do not appear to families.

Where do staff mark a dose given? In the DrBell app on their phone (or on care.drbell.app), where the residents they can see are in the row of names. This console plans and checks the rounds; it has no button for giving a dose.

Can we sign in with Google or Apple? If DrBell has enabled it, those buttons appear on the sign-in screen. Your phone number always works.

What do we pay, and how? A contract with DrBell per resident, invoiced — see The care-home plan.

Settings

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Settings holds four things about the home itself. Owners and admins can change them; everyone else can see what the home is set to, apart from the addresses your own systems receive events at, which only owners and admins see.

When caregivers are told — how long a dose may run late before the people looking after a resident hear about it, once for any medicine (30 minutes unless you change it) and once for a medicine marked critical (15 minutes). A ward wants this short; a team that travels to act wants it longer, because an alert nobody can act on teaches people to ignore alerts. A critical medicine can never be set looser than an ordinary one — marking it critical is what makes its window tighter — and the screen says so before you save. Two switches sit with them: whether staff can read each resident's past doses (Staff can see past doses), and whether the home can invite residents' families (Families can be invited). Save timings.

How the home appears — a logo, a colour and a short tagline. Staff see them in this console's header; families see the logo and "Cared for at" the home's name above a resident's record, on the web and in the app. The colour becomes the buttons' and links' colour in both. It has to be readable as text on white; if it is not, DrBell says by how much and suggests a darker shade. The logo is a PNG, JPEG or WebP image of up to 1MB (no SVG); uploading a new one replaces the old one, and it is visible to anyone with its address, like the sign on the door. Save branding.

Send events to your own systems — owners and admins only. For a rostering system or health record that wants to know, as it happens, when a resident's dose was given, skipped, is running late or was missed, or that a medicine is running low. Give an https address and tick the events; DrBell sends a signed POST there. Private and internal addresses are refused. The signing key appears once, when you add the address or ask for a new key — copy it into the receiving system straight away, because it is not shown again. Late and missed doses are sent even if you have switched family alerts off: the record still needs to know. An address that fails twenty times in a row is switched off; the screen says so, and switching it back on starts the count again. Every change is recorded against the person who made it.

Erase this organisation — owners only. It deletes every resident's record the home holds, permanently: medicines, doses, history, photographs, caregivers and staff access. Use it when the home stops using DrBell, or when asked to under data-protection law, and export anything you must keep first. You type the home's full name to confirm. A home with more than a hundred residents is erased in the background, and disappears from your list when it is done. Families who look after somebody through their own DrBell account keep that account.