When Wendy Tong talks about senior care, she doesn’t begin with technology, revenue or growth charts. She starts with presence—the simple but often overlooked act of slowing down, listening and meeting someone exactly where they are. It is a philosophy shaped not in a boardroom, but in military clinics, leadership posts overseas and years spent treating some of the most medically fragile patients in the system.
A U.S. Air Force veteran and physician, Tong has spent her career navigating high-stakes environments. Today, as founder of Wendy’s Team, she is applying those lessons to one of the country’s most pressing challenges: how to care for an aging population affordably, compassionately and at scale.
Military Foundation
Tong served nearly nine years in the Air Force, beginning her career as a flight surgeon shortly after completing her medical internship. After graduating from her internal medicine residency, during which she was awarded the James J. Leonard Award for Excellence in Teaching Internal Medicine, she finished her service as deputy chief of medical staff at Kadena Air Base in Japan—the largest U.S. Air Force installation in the Pacific. She received the Meritorious Service Award for creating the award-winning Critical Care Medical Attendant Team for the Pacific theater, among other contributions.
The military leadership experience, Tong says, shaped her approach to leadership and systems thinking. “Being in organizational and leadership roles early on really set me up for my subsequent career,” Tong explained, noting how military service exposed her to complex operations and accountability at every level.
After separating honorably from the Air Force, Tong used her Montgomery GI Bill benefits to earn a master’s degree in health administration, which furthered her career as the regional Chief Medical Officer for Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield’s Medicare and Medicaid plans. As a physician executive in managed care, Tong saw how costs, outcomes and patient experience intersect—and often collide.
Care Gaps
Working in internal medicine meant caring for older adults with chronic illness, frailty and end-of-life needs. Over time, Tong noticed a troubling pattern: many costly hospitalizations could have been prevented with modest support in the home.
She also saw an industry struggling with fragmentation and inefficiency. “The senior home care industry is very fragmented,” she said. “I felt it was time to disrupt it.”
That realization led to the founding of Wendy’s Team roughly a decade ago, after Tong relocated to Denver. Encouraged by her then-husband, an entrepreneur, she set out to build a new kind of home care model—one that borrowed from the efficiency of gig-economy platforms while keeping human connection at its core.
Human-Centered Care
Wendy’s Team operates across several Colorado communities, including Denver, Boulder and surrounding cities. The company uses a technology platform to match seniors with independent caregivers, reducing overhead and allowing the business to offer lower costs to clients while paying caregivers competitively.
But Tong is quick to emphasize that technology is only the enabler—not the differentiator.
“What clients remember is the experience of their caregiver,” she said. Tasks like meal preparation or laundry matter, but compassion, patience and presence matter more. Training at Wendy’s Team focuses heavily on what Tong calls the “beingness” of caregiving—understanding how to slow down and work at a senior’s pace.
The workforce itself reflects that philosophy. Team members range in age from their early 20s to their 80s, including students, parents, retirees and those seeking supplemental income.
Future Growth
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Wendy’s Team saw demand increase as seniors avoided institutional settings and faced heightened isolation. More recently, despite economic uncertainty affecting many small businesses, the company reported significant year-over-year growth at the end of 2025.
In January 2026, Tong launched the Patriots Care Fund, a nonprofit that, through private and corporate donors, will pay for senior home care services to support active-duty service members, law enforcement officers and first responders who cannot be physically present to care for aging parents. The goal is to provide peace of mind to our patriots while they are serving their countries and communities—a mission deeply personal to a veteran who understands the cost of service beyond the uniform.
“I see veterans who are serving and simply can’t be there to care for their elderly parents,” Tong said. “If we can take that burden off their families, that matters.”
For Tong, the throughline from military medicine to senior care is clear: leadership is service, and care—done right—is both a responsibility and a calling.
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