COPD24: From Future Internet technologies to health telemonitoring and teletreatment application

Abstract

The emergence of high bandwidth public wireless networks and miniaturized personal mobile devices gives rise to new mobile healthcare services. To this end, the COPD24 system provides highly customizable vital signs tele-monitoring and tele-treatment for Chronic Obtrusive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) patients based on a body area network (BAN) and a mobile health care (m-health) service platform utilizing next generation public wireless networks. The developed system allows the incorporation of diverse medical sensors via wireless connections, and the live transmission of the measured vital signs to healthcare providers as well as real-time feedback to the patient. The system also incorporates environmental state sensors, e.g., air quality sensors deployed in access points of Future Internet (FI) infrastructure, enabling to derive high-granularity, up to date information about the state of the air the patient is in and thus enabling him to make an informed choice on how to manage his health. In this paper we present the COPD system case study, and we derive its design implications for m-health and FI technologies.