RESUMO
BACKGROUND: The risk of nosocomial infection in pediatric patients undergoing heart surgery is high and proportional to the days of stay, mainly in intensive care units. Our objective was to determine the incidence and associated factors to nosocomial infections after a heart surgery. METHODS: Descriptive, retrospective clinical study with 64 pediatric patients underwent to a heart surgery. The χ(2) with Yates fix for nonparametric data test, relative risk, as well as incidence rate were performed. RESULTS: Nosocomial infection prevalence rate was 52; a fatality in infected 21.2, rate not infected of 16.1; the type of nosocomial infection with the highest rate of 65.6 was pneumonia, and the microorganism most common (rate 12.5) was the Candida. The largest number of infection events were 24 with a 37.5 rate. The most significant variables for infection were heart surgery, parenteral nutrition, nasogastric intubation and tracheotomy. CONCLUSIONS: The pediatric patients underwent to a heart surgery presented nosocomial infection in the half of the cases and the fatality rate was higher than the rate reported in literature.