A novel low-cost multisensor-tag for RFID applications in healthcare

Healthcare represents one of the most promising sectors for future RFID applications. RFID, indeed, candidates as a natural solution to a large amount of biomedical problems, from care giving to telemedicine. For a large scale introduction into this market, the integration of RFID systems with a sensor network could be the turnpoint. We focus here on the implementation of a multisensor RFID system able to send information about the physiological status of a patient by simply exploiting its intrinsic characteristics. Without changing the digital design of the chip (hence its basic cost), it is possible to transmit extra-information on sensor parameter variations. Results proposed with respect to the wireless remote monitoring of the patient temperature demonstrate the quality of the proposed technology, and the possibility to be extended to many other biomedical sensors. © 2008 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 50: 2877–2880, 2008; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com). DOI 10.1002/mop.23837