NPPB and breast cancer: Our results are in concordance with most of the recent studies, which have elucidated the correlation between increased NT-proBNP and abnormal myocardial function in patients treated with cytotoxic agents in general, especially in breast cancer patients treated with anthracyclines (Bauch et al., 1992; Suzuki et al., 1998; Nousiainen et al., 2002; Sandri et al., 2005; Soker and Kervancioglu, 2005; Germanakis et al., 2006; Aggarwal et al., 2007).