Power and task management in wireless body area network based medical monitoring systems

Abstract

Intelligent healthcare systems incorporating wireless sensors in a ubiquitous computing environment have the potential to revolutionize outpatient care. Such systems must balance effective and timely reporting of results with power requirements and available communication methods. We intend to design a system based on a wireless body area network (WBAN) which will effectively detect medical problems, reduce the time lag between detection of a medical problem as well as manage power and communications. We plan to develop an algorithm that can find an optimal solution, within an acceptable time, and be faster than current algorithms in assigning tasks and processing and transmitting sensor data such that the system end-to-end delay is minimized while guaranteeing required system battery lifetime and availability. This system will also be able to analyze a patient's health data and report the results to the user while simultaneously converting the sensor data to the standard HL7 (Health Level Seven) format and transmitting it to a healthcare server.