Objective To summarize the clinical characters of acute intestinal obstruction in elderly patient . Methods A retrospective analysis was performed in 183 cases of elderly patient with acute intestinal obstruction, who were operated on in our hospital between October 1992 and October 2001. Results Of the 183 elderly patients who underwent surgical operation, 43.2% was due to strangulated hernia, being a leading cause of the intestinal obstruction in the elderly people. The incidence of colon cancer increased in the elderly. In the same period of this retrospective study, 43 out of 106 elderly inpatients 40.6% (43/106) with colon cancer were admitted to the hospital due to acute intestinal obstruction. Out of the 19 patients with left semicolon cancers, Cancers of 17 cases were surgically removed. Twelve of them were operated on with one stage anastomosis and 2 were complicated with anastomosis fistulas (16.7%). The postoperative fatality rate was 3.3%(6/183), all were died of too late operation. Conclusions The operation intervention is effective in treating acute intestinal obstruction, and is capable of remitting most elderly patient.