Known as Awaiting Bill Settlement (ABS) patients, these women are responsible for looking after and feeding themselves and their newborns.
Four months after giving birth in Umuahia, the capital ofNigeria's southeastern Abia state, 23-year-old single motherAmarachi Amadi is still in hospital with her baby girl.
While the mother and her daughter are in good health, they are not allowed to leave the public hospital until Amadi settles the 543,000 naira ($1,900) bill for their care.
Amadi, who makes a living selling stones to construction workers for 40 naira ($0.15) per sack, fears she may never be able to clear her debt - leaving her and her baby trapped in the Umuahia Federal Medical Centre (FMC) for the foreseeable future.
"I have really suffered ... and they do not allow me to go out," said Amadi, who relies on her mother to bring food into the hospital and to help her care for her baby, Oluebubechi.
New mothers like Amadi are stuck in maternity wards across Nigeria - forbidden from leaving until their debts are settled.
Known as Awaiting Bill Settlement (ABS) patients, these women are responsible for looking after and feeding themselves and their newborns.
Few Nigerians have health insurance, leaving many patients clinging to the hope their bills will be waived by hospital directors or covered by visiting well-wishers.
Meanwhile, whenever the maternity ward at the hospital is full, many ABS patients are forced to sleep on the floor.
"Sometimes, we place all the babies on one bed while the mothers sleep in chairs," said one nurse, who asked not to be named as she was not authorised by the hospital to speak.
"Some babies have stayed here until they started crawling," the nurse said, adding that some mothers had managed to escape the hospital with their babies when no one was watching.
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