I wonder if your getting mixed up between a transformer and an inductor, some inductors look like a transformer, and commonly you will see an inductor on the rectified dc output of a switch mode supply.
If this is the case then the inductor is there to reduce the amount of ac ripple on the output caused by the switching process and the fact that the flyback transformer as allready mentioned cannot produce a steady DC.
The inductor does 'see' some ac, its there to try and remove it.
The main considerations for the inductor are that it doesnt saturate during operation (in most cases) and that it doesnt present too high a dc resistance, there are all sorts of other considerations but these are a couple of the important ones.