The Use of Urinalysis and Urine Culture in Diagnosis: The Role of Uncertainty Tolerance.

A scenario all too familiar to hospital-based physicians: A patient presents to the hospital unwell enough to be admitted with either a nonlocalizing febrile illness or altered mental status in the setting of dementia, in whom a urinalysis finds leukocytes or nitrites, and a urine culture reveals growth of a common culprit for bacterial urinary tract infections (UTI).