Does a nursing home have legal standing to call APS if the patient doesn't want to thicken his liquids at home?

Why would they not have just promised to thicken his liquids and then do as they want once at home? I don't think they can compel them to do anything, thicken liquids, take medications, do exercises etc. As long as they are both competent they can make all the bad decisions they want to.
By the way, they might both change their minds after he chokes a few times.

We diligently tried thickened liquids for my husband. We went through one of those giant cans from the drug store. (Do you know that thickener in beer makes a big foamy mess?) And then we stopped that and the special diet. Coy didn't want to do it anymore. He was quite depressed over it. I supported his decision. The man was dying. He ought to be able to decide which risks he was willing to take.

I told the speech therapist flat out we would not be following the diet. His doctors knew and supported his decision. I would gladly have taken on the APS if they thought they had any business coming in. No one even mentioned that.

An adult who has not been found incompetent by the state may make is own medical decisions. A person can decide not to have chemo even if 50 people assure him it would be the best thing. A person can reject advice about exercising and sleeping and medications. And a person can eat and drink as he sees fit.

I don't know the circumstances your grandparents are facing, Finn33, so I don't feel qualified to urge them to follow the official medical advice. Maybe that would be best, or maybe not. I would make sure that Grandpa clearly knows the risks, and let him make up his own mind.

(My husband said he would rather choke to death than to continue with the diet. I believed him. He became increasingly depressed on it.)

By the way, there is no 100% effective way to prevent aspirational pneumonia. Diet and thickening liquids may reduce the risk. But it is possible to aspirate one's own saliva, and that is very full of germs.

Ditto the above. Just tell the rehab what they want to hear and then go home and do what you want. Why is that even an issue? I personally would want to do anything necessary to make my or my loved one's life a little more comfortable and aspiration pneumonia and choking isn't comfortable. Just my opinion.

I'd suggest the same thing; tell them the plan will be accepted; do what they want at home, but they are taking a chance if he needs thickened liquids and doesn't have them. I assume that "frank" aspiration is an issue, so he would be wise to heed their advice.

Apparently he has some dysphagia so he might need a more specialized diet. If he doesn't follow some advice on this issue, he may find himself back in the hospital. But it sounds as if he and his wife are going to do what he wants.

They should at least try various thickened liquids; they're not all the same. It might even be that his wife could make something like the popular smoothies and those would be more palatable than nursing home thickened liquids.

I think the facility is concerned for their liability even though they've advised him strongly enough what precautions to take. And it may just be that they're especially concerned and don't want him to develop additional problems, which he just might if he can't swallow thin liquids.

As to "legal standing", I think anyone who feels he/she has information on abuse COULD have legal standing; the question would be whether the information and the evaluation support and bear out the accusations. I'm not really sure "legal standing" is necessary to report someone to APS; however, the threatened abuse hasn't yet occurred.

One other thing, even in my parents' extremely difficult situation, APS only sent a social worker by their home to talk to them and provide them with lists of home care workers and the like. They had no power to compel my parents to do a thing. But it was certainly a comfort to me at the time that they were stopping by to see them on occasion.

So my mom just left the facility, and the PA (physicians assistant) told my mom and my grandma that my grandfather that he has pneumonia and he would have to stay a day or two more. When my mom questioned when they discovered this, she said they did an X-ray yesterday. When she brought a copy of the report the time stamp was from when my grandma was there and he was never taken to any tests.... When my grandma said that the PA took the paper out of my moms hands and told them she'd me right back. When she returned she told my mom and grandparents that he was fine to go home tomorrow as planned...so five minutes ago he had pneumonia and had to stay and now he is fine?! I told my mom this is malpractice, they told them a diagnosis that was not true and a copy of a test that was not given. They are also withholding his nerve med because it's an inconvenient time to be given, so unless he calls and asks for it they just don't give it to him! I think a lawyer should be called, what do you all think?

That is what I told them to say, as long as they completely understand the consequences of thin liquids just say they will comply and do what they want when they leave. Before that could even be said the physicians assistant tried to lie to my family to keep him there.

I am just curious, and forgive me if I'm off base here, but is English the primary language of your grandparents? I'm just wondering if there could be an attempt to bully them due to a misunderstanding of some sort.

I'm a rebel at heart. This is what I would do. I would tell the NH that I was doing just exactly what they said to do. Then when I got home, I would do just exactly what I and the patient wanted to do. I've actually done that myself with no harm done.