Objective: To investigate the factors of influencing the effect of percutaneous catheter drainage (PCD) on the treatment of acute pancreatitis (AP) complicated with necrotic infection. Methods: The clinical and CT imaging data of 74 patients with AP complicated with necrotic infection treated by PCD in our hospital from October 2014 to August 2017 were analyzed retrospectively. Single factor and multiple factor Logistic regression analysis were performed to determine the clinical and radiological prediction index of PCD treatment outcome. Results: Among these patients, the success rate of PCD was 58.1% (43/74), and 31 cases (41.9%) were converted to surgical necrosectomy after previous PCD. Single factor analysis showed that the imaging index of percentage of pancreatic necrosis (P<0.001), size (P=0.038), number (P=0.010), contents (P=0.001) and encapsulation of the collection (P=0.029), and the clinical indicators of persistent organ failure (P=0.013) were significantly associated with the outcome of PCD. However, the demographic characteristics of age, gender, etiology, bedside index for severity in AP (BISAP), white blood cell count, C reaction protein, organ failure (with or without, solitary or multiple, transient or not) had no significant association with the outcome of PCD (P>0.05). Multivariate Cox regression analysis showed that only the percentage of pancreatic necrosis >50% (OR=1.75, 95%CI 1.39–3.76, P=0.013), multiple collection (OR=2.04, 95%CI 1.83–5.92, P=0.001), heterogeneous collection (OR=2.76, 95%CI 1.47–6.58, P<0.001) and persistent organ failure (OR=1.27, 95%CI 1.20–2.97, P=0.035) were the independent predictors of PCD converted to surgical necrosectomy for treating infected necrotizing pancreatitis. Conclusion: PCD has a high success rate for the necrosis infection of AP. CT imaging evaluation, especially the contents and number of collection, and the percentage of pancreatic necrosis, has a important value in predicting the outcome of PCD.