NPPB and heart failure: BNP is known to be associated with LVH (Cosson 2004; Ritchie et al. 2009), a common condition in CKD, which often leads to heart failure (Bluemke et al. 2008) and increased risks of hospitalization and mortality (Gwadry-Sridhar et al. 2004; Sciacqua et al. 2006; Pons et al. 2010).