Objective To analyze the causes of corrosive esophageal burn in children, the pre-hospital cares and family members′ knowledge about the safety of corrosive substances, so as to afford standardized prevention. Methods A total of 32 cases of pediatric corrosive esophageal burn admitted by the Pediatric Surgery Department of the Second Affiliated Hospital of Xi ′an Jiaotong University from January 2001 to January 2019 were reviewed, and were grouped by rural areas and urban areas, the families′ educational level and the knowledge about the safety of corrosive substances. The results were analysed using the software SPSS 24.0. Results There were 24 cases (75.0%) in rural areas, 8 cases (25.0%) in urban areas of 32 cases. The family members of 11 cases said they had known about the knowledge of corrosive substances, including 4 in rural areas and 7 in urban areas, the family members of 9 cases said that they had taken relevant pre-hospital cares, including 3 in rural areas and 6 in urban areas, both of the percentage of family members in rural areas who had knowledge about corrosive substances and adopted pre-hospital cares were significantly lower than those in urban areas, with 16.7%, 12.5% and 87.5%, 75.0%, respectively (P<0.05). The prognosis of the children who received pre-hospital cares was significantly better than that of the children who did not receive pre-hospital cares, with fewer balloon dilation times and shorter hospitalization days [(6.00±2.89)times and (9.00±2.94)times respectively, t=2.61, P<0.05; (56.00±3.65)d and 65.00±9.53)d respectively, t=2.73,P<0.05). Conclusions Children corrosive esophageal burns occurs is not only related to the characteristics of the children themselves, but also is closely related to the geography, family, society, etc. The certain pre-hospital cares have obvious positive effect to the prognosis, reminding that relevant departments should strengthen the educational propaganda work on the safety knowledge of corrosive substance, especially focusing on the vast rural areas.