Objective To explore experience and needs for humanistic care among parents of acute leukemia children receiving maintenance care of a PICC, and to provide references for targeted nursing intervention. Methods A total of 15 parents of acute leukemia children receiving maintenance care of a PICC were invited to join in semi-structured interviews.Then the data were analyzed with Colaizzi′s 7-step analytical method. Results Four themes of humanistic care experience were extracted from the interviews: nurses offer active service and always think of others; nurses provide skillful service with gentleness; nurses respect and show understan-ding and sympathy for the family members of patients; nurses are good at communication. Four themes of humanistic care needs were extracted as follows: the needs of knowledge of PICC daily care; the needs to maintain patient dignity; the needs to receive humanistic care in different forms; the needs to have more PICC maintenance sites. Conclusion Parents of acute leukemia children had positive attitudes towards humanistic care during PICC maintenance.Yet they had a variety of special needs. Measures should be taken to improve PICC maintenance service, and satisfy the parents′ need of humanistic care through various ways.