Table. Description of Included Studies.

Study	Date	Design	Setting	Symptoms of Population	Data on Prevalence (% of Patients)a	Scoreb
Bacteremia-only studies
Chiu et al,19 1994	1992-1993	P, C	ED (Taiwan)	Temperature ≥38.0°C; previously healthyc	0-31 d: All 254 had blood culture, 13 B (5)d	9
Bonsu et al,13 2003	1992-1999	R, C	ED	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°C in ED or home	Study (n = 3961), 151 excluded for missing data, 1353 aged >56 d; 0-28 d: all 950 had blood culture, 14 B (2); 29-56 d: all 1507 had blood culture, 17 B (1)	7
Chiu et al,20 1997	1994-1995	P, C	ED (Taiwan)	Temperature ≥38.0°C; previously healthyc	0-28 d: All 250 had blood culture, 11 B (4)d	9
Garcia et al,22 2012e	2003-2010	R, C	ED (Spain)	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°C in ED or home	0-28 d: 207 of 307 had blood culture, 8 B (4)d; 29-56 d: 620 of 641 had blood culture, 21 B (3)d	8
				No obvious source of fever
				No respiratory symptoms
				No diarrhea
Meningitis-only studies
None
Bacteremia and meningitis studies
Ferrera et al,18 1997	1990-1994	R, C	ED	Temperature ≥38.0°C in ED or home	0-28 d: (n = 188), 167 (89) had blood culture and 148 (79) had CSF culture, 6 B (4), 4 M (3); B/M concurrence not reportedf	8
				No obvious infectious source
Bonadio et al,14 1993	1991-2000	P, C	ED	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°C in ED or home	28-56 d: All 534 had blood culture and CSF culture, 7 B (1), 4 M (1); no concurrent B/M	9
Bachur and Harper,3 2001e	1993-1999	R, C	ED	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°Cc	0-30 d: (n = 1298), 1215 (94) had blood culture and 1147 (88) had CSF culture, 26 B (2), 10 M (1); B/M concurrence not reported. 31-60 d: (n = 2104), 1866 (89) had blood culture and 1717 (82) had CSF culture, 19 B (1), 4 M (0); B/M concurrence not reported	8
Baker and Bell,15 1999	1994-1996	P, C	ED	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°Cc	3-28 d: All 254 had blood culture and CSF culture, 8 B (3), 4 M (2); 3 concurrent B/M	8
Herr et al,17 2001	1999-2000	R, C	ED	Temperature ≥38.0°Cc	0-28 d: (n = 179), 13 excluded for missing data, all remaining 166 had blood culture and CSF culture, 1B (1), 2 M (1); no concurrent B/M; 29-60 d: (n = 285), 17 excluded for missing data, all remaining 268 had blood culture and CSF culture, 6 B (2), 0 M (0)	8
Caviness et al,16 2008	2001-2005	R, C	ED	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°C in ED	0-28 d: (n = 960), 893 (93) had blood culture and 874 (91) had CSF culture, 30 B (3), 13 M (1)g; B/M concurrence not reported	6
Zarkesh et al,21 2011	2004-2009	R, C	ED (Iran)	Temperature ≥38.5°C in ED	0-28 d: (n = 253), 51 excluded for incomplete records, all remaining 202 had blood culture and CSF culture, 8 B (4), 1 M (0); 1 concurrent B/M	8
				No prior admission
				Full term
				No chronic disease
				No recent antibiotics
Ashkenazi-Hoffnung et al,23 2011e	2005-2009	P, C	Pediatric department (Israel, unclear if ED or clinic)	Rectal temperature ≥38.0°Cc	Study (n = 1584) of febrile infants aged ≤90 d, but only those aged 0-28 d were consecutive; 0-28 d: all 510 had blood culture and CSF culture, 12 B (2), 0 M (0)	9
				No chronic disease
				Born >34 wk
				No recent antibiotics

Abbreviations: B, bacteremia; C, consecutively enrolled patients; CSF, cerebrospinal fluid; ED, emergency department; M, meningitis; P, prospective; R, retrospective.

^aPercentages are rounded to nearest integer.

^bNewcastle-Ottawa Scale bias scores range from 1 (worst) to 9 (best).

^cUnclear whether this status needed to be during evaluation or if it could have been at home as well.

^dUnable to use CSF culture data owing to inability to identify the total number of CSF cultures obtained or owing to potential selection bias (eg, CSF culture obtained only if clinical suspicion for meningitis).

^eAdditional unpublished data obtained via correspondence with original authors.

^fThere were 724 infants presenting in the ED; 43 incomplete records were excluded; of the remaining 681 infants, 188 had fever without an obvious source, 21 had undocumented blood culture, and 40 had undocumented CSF culture.

^gThere may have been 12 of 874 (1%); unclear owing to rounding in the fluid cultures of the original study.