Earlier today as I was cleaning my home, I left my 2 year old daughter, Izabel, alone for 2 minutes to put something up. Normally, this is not a problem, but today, she somehow found the diaper cream and had gotten the lid off. When I walked back into the living room, she was sitting on the couch, happily sucking on the contents of the container.
I immediately grabbed it from her and noticed the amount of cream around her mouth. After I wiped off her face (so she couldn't lick any off her face) and put the cream in a safer (higher) place, I called the California Poison Control.
The guy on the on other side of the line was very friendly. I told him that I had found my 2 year old sucking on an open container of diaper cream and he asked me how she appeared to be doing at the moment. At that moment she was sulking around the house like she was in trouble, so I told the guy she seemed ok. He then went on to gather the information about the cream.
The main concern was the active ingredient, zinc oxide. The guy told me that they get tons of calls about kids eating stuff with this particular ingredient. He then told me that unless she ingested large amounts of it (which this didn't seem the case), there was no need to take her to the doctor or emergency room. The most it would do it give her a tummy ache with possible nausea and vomiting. He also instructed me to give her plenty of fluids to help flush her system, and to keep her upright for the next hour (and keep an eye on her, of course).
I am just thankful that it wasn't as bad as it could've been.