diff --git a/Documentation/power/runtime_pm.txt b/Documentation/power/runtime_pm.txt
index 44fe1d28a163..e76dc0ad4d2b 100644
--- a/Documentation/power/runtime_pm.txt
+++ b/Documentation/power/runtime_pm.txt
@@ -556,6 +556,12 @@ helper functions described in Section 4.  In that case, pm_runtime_resume()
 should be used.  Of course, for this purpose the device's runtime PM has to be
 enabled earlier by calling pm_runtime_enable().
 
+Note, if the device may execute pm_runtime calls during the probe (such as
+if it is registers with a subsystem that may call back in) then the
+pm_runtime_get_sync() call paired with a pm_runtime_put() call will be
+appropriate to ensure that the device is not put back to sleep during the
+probe. This can happen with systems such as the network device layer.
+
 It may be desirable to suspend the device once ->probe() has finished.
 Therefore the driver core uses the asyncronous pm_request_idle() to submit a
 request to execute the subsystem-level idle callback for the device at that