Schisandrin is the main active ingredient isolated from Schisandra chinensis Baill. Recent studies have demonstrated that schisandrin exhibits anti-inflammatory effects in vivo and in vitro. In this study, we examined whether the order of lipopolysaccharide (LPS) treatment affects the mechanism of schisandrin anti-inflammatory activity. We found that the anti-inflammatory mechanisms are not the same depending on whether macrophages were treated with schisandrin before or after LPS. The main difference is that inhibitor $kappaB{alpha}$ ($I{kappa}B{alpha}$) degradation was not inhibited when macrophages were pretreated by LPS before schisandrin and was weakly inhibited when macrophages were pretreated by schisandrin before LPS.