Abstract: OBJECTIVE To explore the prevalence of postoperative bacterial infection in the hand surgery patients and analyze the influencing factors. METHODS The clinical data of 1 568 patients who received open hand surgery from Apr 2013 to Oct 2016 were retrospectively analyzed. The incidence rates of postoperative infection and species of pathogens were statistically analyzed. The clinical data were collected from the patients, including age, interval between injury and surgery, operation duration and underlying diseases; univariate analysis and multivariate analysis were performed for influencing factors for the postoperative infection; the levels of perioperative serum inflammatory cytokines (TNF-α, IL-6,IL-10) of the patients with postoperative wound infection were determined by using ELISA. RESULTS Of the 1 568 patients who received the open hand surgery, 55 had postoperative wound infection, with the incidence rate 3.51%. A total of 70 strains of pathogens were isolated from the specimens of the 55 patients with postoperative wound infection, 44 (62.86%) of which were gram-positive bacteria, 26 (37.14%) were gram-negative bacteria. The result of multivariate logistic regression analysis indicated that the no less than 50 years of age, interval between injury and surgery no less than 6 hours, operation duration no less than 2, complication with underlying diseases and severe wound contamination were the influencing factors for the postoperative infection. The serum TNF-α level of the patients with postoperative infection declined gradually, the levels of IL-6 and IL-10 were remarkably elevated after the surgery for 3 and 5 days and then were gradually decreased (P<0.05). CONCLUSIONS The gram-positive bacteria are the major pathogens causing the postoperative infection in the open hand surgery patients. The no less than 50 years of age, interval between injury and surgery no less than 6 hours, operation duration no less than 2, complication with underlying diseases and wound contamination are the influencing factors for the postoperative bacterial infection; the prophylactic use of antibiotics is the protective factor. The detection of the postoperative serum inflammatory cytokines of the hand injury patients may facilitate the evaluation of illness condition.