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Background and Aim: Nowadays using herbal medicine is common among people. A large number of patients who take pharmaceuticals also use herbal medicine without knowing anything about the interaction between them. The present study was carried out to determine the effect of consuming garlic before anesthesia on the process of anesthesia with Halothane and Thiopental in male mice.

Materials and Methods: In this study 24 mice with the average weight of 30±5 gr were divided into 4 groups (6 in each). Two groups of the animals received 40mg/kg of garlic concentrate intraperitoneally in the morning and in the afternoon for three successive weeks and after a two days' rest one of the groups were injected with halothane and the other one received pentobarbital. Simultaneously, the remaining two groups were injected with physiologic saline intraperitoneally and under the same condition. After anesthesia, four variables namely induction (A), duration (B), recovery (C) and heart rate (D) were assessed. The obtained data was analysed by means of SPSS software (12.0) and statistical t-test and P≤0.05 was taken as the significant level.

Results: In the former 2 groups which had been injected with "Halothane" and "Halothane+garlic" there was a significant difference in the variables A (P<0.001), C (P<0.001) and D (P<0.05). In the latter 2 groups injected with "Pentobarbital" and "Pentobarbital + garlic" there was a significant difference in all the four variables (P<0.05).

Conclusion: Regarding the findings of this study and applying them to humans, positive and negative effects of simultaneous use of garlic together with anesthetic drugs must be taken into account. Thus, the dose of the drugs must be determined more accurately.