Physician Investigator (Cl) General Internal Medicine, Mass General Research Institute

Professor of Medicine Harvard Medical School

Physician Medicine-General Internal Medicine, Massachusetts General Hospital

MD Harvard Medical School 1978

cigarette smoking; electronic cigarettes; nicotine; secondhand smoke; smoking cessation; tobacco cessation treatment; tobacco use disorder

Nancy Rigotti, MD, is a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Associate Chief for Academic Advancement in the Division of General Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital. Trained as an academic general internist, she completed the MGH primary care internal medicine residency program and Harvard Medical School's research fellowship in general medicine and primary care.

Dr. Rigotti's research has aimed to reduce the enormous global burden of tobacco-related disease and death by promoting tobacco cessation and tobacco control policy. She is internationally known for her leadership to promote tobacco cessation treatment, especially integrating its delivery throughout health care systems. Dr. Rigotti is Past President of both the Society for Research in Nicotine and Tobacco and the Society of General Internal Medicine. 

Dr. Rigotti founded and directs Mass General Hospital’s Tobacco Research and Treatment Center (TRTC) a multi-disciplinary team that aims to reduce the improve the delivery of tobacco treatment interventions across health care settings in the US and internationally. This work includes developing, evaluating, and implementing novel tobacco cessation treatments.  The group also focuses on tobacco use in marginalized groups which have a higher prevalence of tobacco use and less access to and success with evidence-based treatments.  The TRTC group also takes a multidisciplinary approach, combining efforts to change individual behavior with policy interventions to influence individuals’ decisions about starting or continuing to smoke or use tobacco.

Her current work includes investigations of cytisine, a naturally-occurring plant-based alkaloid, for its effectiveness to aid smoking cessation and its potential to become an affordable treatment available to tobacco users worldwide. She also studies the safety and effectiveness of electronic cigarettes as smoking cessation and harm reduction tools. Dr. Rigotti was a member of the National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine panel that produced the landmark 2018 report, Public Health Consequences of E-Cigarettes and a scientific co-editor of the 25^th anniversary U.S. Surgeon General’s Report.  She is a current member of the Tobacco Products Scientific Advisory Committee of the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Tobacco Products. 

A second focus of Dr. Rigotti's career is women’s health and women’s careers in medicine. She was a founding member of Mass General Women’s Health Associates, one of the nation’s first women’s health practices, and served for a decade as Director of the Mass General's Office of Women's Careers.