Abbreviations: IQR: interquartile range; WBCs: white blood cells.
a Pathogenic organisms were defined a priori as organisms that are not expected to be found in oropharyngeal flora, according to our Microbiology Lab’s guidelines as previously described.21
b Calculated using generalized linear mixed models.
c Acute respiratory infection defined as presence of an International Classification of Diseases-Ninth or Tenth Revision diagnosis code (consistent with previously described codes21) during the encounter in which culture was collected.
d Excludes 234 cultures for which no diagnosis data was available.
e Primary care or other subspecialty clinic.
f Excludes 18 culture results without documentation of WBC count.