Nicole L. Spartano, PhD

Assistant Professor, Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine

Biography

Nicole Spartano, PhD is an Assistant Professor of Medicine in Endocrinology, Diabetes, Nutrition and Weight Management at the Chobanian and Avedisian School of Medicine. She serves as the Director of the Glucose Monitoring Station at the Framingham Heart Study. This study is funded through an R01 from the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases (Spartano, PI) to use continuous glucose monitors in a non-diabetic population to measure glucose patterns that may predict the development of diabetes. She also serves as the Co-Director of the Physical Activity Station at the Framingham Heart Study, overseeing data collection using accelerometers (fitness trackers). She has received funding from the American Heart Association and Alzheimer's Association to understand the impact of physical activity throughout the lifecourse on brain health and the risk for dementia and Alzheimer's disease.

Dr. Spartano also has a major research interest in using mobile health technology to improve health in underserved patient populations at Boston Medical Center. She is exploring the use of continuous glucose monitors as a tool for enhancing lifestyle interventions in patients with and without diabetes mellitus. She shares a MPI role on a Focused Research Project funded by Boston University’s Hariri Institute, which facilitates collaborations of clinical and computational investigators. This team is developing a software platform that can continuously collect mobile health data from research participants and patients. The goal of creating this platform is to address challenges in privacy and in providing timely communication to medically vulnerable patients.

Dr. Spartano also teaches courses for Boston University Graduate Medical Sciences, School of Public Health, and Sargent College of Health Sciences.

Publications

  • Published 10/1/2025

    Rodriguez JA, Palermo NE, Song W, Lipsitz S, Caballero AE, Samal L, Spartano NL. Lack of Association Between Hemoglobin A1c and Continuous Glucose Monitor Metrics Among Individuals with Prediabetes and Normoglycemia. Diabetes Technol Ther. 2025 Oct 01. PMID: 41027845.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 9/12/2025

    Ding H, Brown S, Paquette DR, Orwig TA, Spartano NL, Lin H. Passive Measures of Physical Activity and Cadence as Early Indicators of Cognitive Impairment: Observational Study. J Med Internet Res. 2025 Sep 12; 27:e72946. PMID: 40939123.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 7/31/2025

    Bakhshi B, Sultana N, Lin H, Fei D, Vallejo V, Gatanti A, Steenkamp DW, Murabito JM, McKeown NM, Walker ME, Spartano NL. Associations of diet composition and quality with continuous glucose monitor-derived glycemic metrics in a community-based cohort. Am J Clin Nutr. 2025 Jul 31. PMID: 40749968.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 6/20/2025

    Rizvi N, Lin H, Beiser AS, Spartano NL. How Do Occupational Sedentary Behavior and Occupational Cognitive Complexity Relate to Cognitive Function? A Cross-Sectional Study. Health Sci Rep. 2025 Jun; 8(6):e70949. PMID: 40547068.

    Read at: PubMed

  • Published 6/3/2025

    Wang X, Zhang Y, Pathiravasan CH, Spartano NL, Benjamin EJ, McManus DD, Lewis GD, Larson MG, Vasan RS, Murabito JM, Liu C, Nayor M. Blood Pressure Responses During Exercise Were Associated With Average Home Blood Pressure and Home Blood Pressure Variability: The Electronic Framingham Heart Study. J Am Heart Assoc. 2025 Jun 03; 14(11):e039457. PMID: 40459124.

    Read at: PubMed

View All 78 Publications:   View Full Profile in BUMC

Other Positions

  • Investigator
    Framingham Heart Study
  • Member, Evans Center for Interdisciplinary Biomedical Research
    Boston University
  • Graduate Faculty (Primary Mentor of Grad Students)
    Boston University Chobanian & Avedisian School of Medicine, Graduate Medical Sciences

Websites

Education

  • Tufts University, PhD
  • Tufts University, MS
  • Syracuse University, BS

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