Love and Sex in the Nursing Home? Ethicist Says, 'Why Not?'

This transcript has been edited for clarity.

Hi. I'm Art Caplan. I'm at the Division of Medical Ethics at the NYU Grossman School of Medicine.

I have an interesting case. A couple of years ago, a woman came in to my office with her kids in tow. She had tracked me down and she wanted to complain about something. Her complaint was that her mom, who was in a nursing home and had mild dementia, had taken up with one of the male patients and they were having sex.

She thought that was inappropriate and something the nursing home should be stopping immediately, and wanted to know if I would help her talk with the nursing home administrator about getting these two to knock off their canoodling.

I talked to her and I asked, "Do you think, even though your mom is mildly demented, that she's incompetent and that she doesn't know what's going on in this relationship at all? Is she being abused, coerced, or sexually assaulted?"

She said no. She said that her mom had cognitive deficit, but it wasn't to the point where she didn't recognize the man that she was with, didn't enjoy company, or didn't enjoy sexual activity.