A Nigerian woman has alleged severe medical negligence after a hospital reportedly forgot a medical pad inside her body while stitching a cervical tear she sustained during childbirth.
Narrating her ordeal in an emotional account shared online, the woman said she never imagined hospital negligence was real until she experienced it firsthand.
“Did I mention that the hospital I gave birth in actually forgot a pad inside my body while they were stitching the cervical tear that I had?” she said. “They used it to clean the blood and everything, but they left it inside my body. I never knew hospital negligence was real until this happened to me.”
According to her, the pad remained inside her body for six days, during which she suffered unbearable pain. She recalled that on the first day after delivery, her husband noticed a whitish substance while helping her dress.
“My husband asked me what it was, and I told him it was probably the rope they used to stitch the tear and that it would dry up with my body,” she explained, adding that she did not know it was part of the pad protruding from her body.
She said after they were discharged from the hospital, the object continued to come out gradually and became more visible. A few days later, the situation worsened when an extremely offensive smell developed.
“The smell was like a dead body,” she said. “Anytime my husband wanted to stay with me in the bathroom while I did sitz baths, he had to tie his nose. That’s how bad it was.”
The woman said the pain and smell persisted through her child’s naming ceremony and became unbearable one night when she attempted another sitz bath.
“The more I was doing the sit bath, the more the smell was coming out. I didn’t know it was the part inside my body that was smelling,” she said. “That night, I couldn’t sleep at all because of the pain.”
She said she contacted her elder sister, who raised the possibility that something may have been forgotten inside her body during delivery.
“She kept asking if I was sure they didn’t forget something inside me,” the woman said.
Following her sister’s advice, she recorded a video of the protruding object and sent it to a nurse she knew.
“Immediately she saw the video, she shouted and told me I had to remove it immediately,” she recounted.
“She explained that it was what the doctor used to clean the blood and that the nurses were supposed to remove it but forgot it inside my body.”
The nurse reportedly advised her to either return to the hospital for immediate removal or remove it herself to avoid further complications. Fearing additional pain if she returned to the hospital, the woman said she chose to remove it on her own.
“I spent hours in the bathroom trying to remove it,” she said. “You needed to see the way my whole house was smelling, like somebody died.”
She said she felt instant relief after successfully removing the pad and was finally able to sleep without crying or taking pain medication.
The disturbing account, shared by the woman identified online as @bigmjayherself, has since sparked outrage and renewed conversations about patient safety, accountability, and maternal healthcare standards in Nigeria.
