Abstract: OBJECTIVE To explore the effect of prophylactic use of antibiotics on control of postoperative infections in children so as to reduce the incidence of postoperative infections in the children. METHODS A total of 120 children who were hospitalized and receive surgical procedures from Jan 2013 to Dec 2015 were recruited as the study objects and were divided into the antibiotic prophylaxis group and the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group according to the status of prophylactic use of antibiotics, with 60 cases in each group.The incidence of postoperative infections was observed and compared between the two groups of children, and the statistical analysis of data was performed with the use of SPSS19.0 software. RESULTS The incidence of postoperative infections was 3.4% in the antibiotics prophylaxis group, significantly lower than 13.3% in the non-antibiotics prophylaxis group(P＜0.01).The leukocytes counts were (1.2±0.2)×10⁹/L in the antibiotics prophylaxis group after the surgery for 3 days, (6.7±0.5)×10⁹/L in the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group; the neutrophil ratio was (55.6±8.5)% in the antibiotic prophylaxis group, (78.3±9.1)% in the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group, and there was significant difference between the two groups (P＜0.01).The time of use of antibiotics of the antibiotic prophylaxis group was (3.4±0.7) days, shorter than (5.6±1.1) days of the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group; the length of hospital stay of the antibiotic prophylaxis group was (7.3±1.5) days, shorter than (9.2±1.7) days of the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group; the total treatment cost of the antibiotic prophylaxis group was (2351.6±371.5) yuan, less than (2952.6±456.4) yuan of the non-antibiotic prophylaxis group. CONCLUSIONThe prophylactic use of antibiotics can achieve significant effect on control of postoperative infections in the children receiving surgical procedures, alleviate inflammatory reactions, shorten the length of hospital stay, and reduce the hospitalization cost.