The comments that accompany our news articles on SunSentinel.com can often be pretty nasty, but now and then we get something that's really useful.

This morning, we received one such helpful comment in response to an article I wrote about a child who died after his mother gave him a sleeping pill meant for adults. Apparently they found 4-year-old Nicholas Ordze next to several open bottles, but they weren't sure he had taken anything. They went to sleep, and when the parents woke up the next morning, Nicholas didn't.

A reader identified as "paisleyk" wrote in with the following (cleaned up for a family audience):

The thing that bothers me (aside from the whole giving a 4 year old an xxxx Lunesta!!) is that they found him with all the other bottles and weren't sure if he took anything else. I have two little ones that got into a child proof Advil bottle in my purse once. I called that poison hotline 800-222-1222. They answered on the first ring and couldn't have been nicer or helpful. They had me tell them what the worst case scenario was (how many pills missing) and calculated against each child's bodyweight.

Paisleyk, thank you for a terrific reminder of a valuable resource available to every parent, guardian or caregiver.

Waiting for the child to look or feel sick is a mistake in such cases. By then, whatever poison has been ingested is doing what could be preventable damage. If you even think your child might have possibly swallowed a medicine he shouldn't have, call that hotline 800-222-1222.

Whether Nicholas' death was a tragedy, criminal negligence or something worse is for the justice system to decide. But parents don't need to wait for the case to work its way through the system to remind themselves of the importance of childproofing or of keeping that phone number handy. Put it on your speed dial. Tape it to your refrigerator. Wherever there's a phone, this number should be there. I'm going to put it in my address book right now.

Poison control: 800-222-1222.