Maude Boone, 102, can finally eat salt beef again with new dentures

A 102-year-old woman in western Newfoundland is finally able to eat her favourite meals again, thanks to the generosity of a business owner who replaced her missing dentures.

Maude Boone lost her dentures in November during a stay in Western Memorial Regional Hospital in Corner Brook.

All Boone wanted was a bit of salt beef, but for the next few weeks her family struggled to find someone who could help replace the missing dentures.

"I didn't kick up much trouble," said Boone. "There was nothing I could do about it, they were gone."

"All of her food was mashed, it was all mashed up and she'd eat a little bit, but it wasn't the same for her," said Julia Sharpe, Boone's granddaughter.

"She always asked for her teeth every day, she'd ask for her teeth and we had to tell her that she didn't have any teeth."

Sharpe said she tried to find a clinic in Corner Brook that would help the family, but was unable to make contact during the busy Christmas season.

That is, until she got in touch with a denturist in nearby Deer Lake.

"If that were my family member I would want someone to help them out," denturist Jamie Fitzgerald told CBC News Tuesday.

"And that's what I try to do. Sometimes karma is the way it works and sometimes it comes back to you and if you can help someone out, then why not?"

No more mashed foods

Sharpe sent her husband to visit Fitzgerald's office in Deer Lake, a roughly 50 kilometre trip, to ask if he'd be willing to help.

Salt beef and cabbage, turnip. [I] can eat it all.- 102-year-old Maude Boone

"I asked reception at the door how kind this denturist was. She looked at me and she said, 'Very kind,' and I told her a little bit of the story and I said I need to speak to him," said Sharpe.

"He said, 'If I don't do it who will?' so he told me to leave it with him and he called me a couple days later and said that he'd do it."

Fitzgerald said he doesn't often do house calls, but this family's situation stood out to him.

"It's more difficult when you have to leave the clinic to go and do work, but given the fact of the situation she was in, a bit of a desperate situation, she was having a difficult time eating and whatnot so I kind of felt for her," he said.

Sharpe said she didn't know what to expect with Fitzgerald took on the task, and her family is grateful for the help they received.

"I would like to have him recognized for that because he went way beyond the call of duty for a patient … because he made at least six trips down from Deer Lake to get her teeth for her."

For Boone, the new teeth mean she can get back to eating her favourite foods again.

"Salt beef and cabbage, turnip. [I] can eat it all."