Impact of order set design on urine culturing practices at an academic medical centre emergency department.

A simple intervention of retaining only 'urinalysis with reflex to microscopy' and removing all other urine tests from the 'frequently ordered' window of the ED electronic order set decreased urine cultures ordered by 46.6% after accounting for temporal trends. Given the injudicious use of antimicrobial therapy for asymptomatic bacteriuria, findings from our study suggest that proper design of electronic order sets plays a vital role in reducing excessive ordering of urine cultures.