الفهرس 
CHAPTER (I): General introduction andOnly 14 pages are availabe for public view
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Abstract
A Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is a major global health
problem. The current therapies are inadequate and have numerous adverse effects.
There is an acute need of potential alternative therapies. Echinacea Purpurea was one
of the medicinal plants that showed highly effectiveness in the therapy of chronic
recurrent respiratory disease.
The present study represented the first attempt to determine the preventive and
therapeutic effects of Echinacea against COPD. Accordingly, this investigation
focused on the markers of oxidative stress and inflammatory biomarkers to study
the role of Echinacea as a novel therapy for COPD.
Our study was carried out on 68 Male Wistar’s rats; were randomly arranged
into three main groups:
- Control group (4 healthy rats).
- COPD -protected groups (40 rats ), were divided into:
Group (I) Included (8 rats) and continued for (2weeks),
Group (II) Included (8 rats) and continued for (4weeks),
Group (III) Included (8 rats) and continued for (6weeks),
Group (IV) Included (8 rats) and continued for (8weeks),
Group (V) Included (8 rats) and continued for (10 weeks).
Each group was subdivided into two subgroups (Echinacea (E) – administered
subgroup (A) and Cigarettes smoke (CS) – exposed Subgroup (B)); each contained (4
rats).
- COPD - recovery groups (24 rats ), were divided into:
Group (VI) Included (12 rats) and continued for (2weeks),
Group (VII) Included (12 rats) and continued for (4weeks).
Each group was subdivided into three subgroups (E – treated +CS stopped
.