An Analysis of Bluetooth, Zigbee and Bluetooth Low Energy and Their Use in WBANs

A rapid development of services and technologies in the field of health care has been witnessed in the last few years. In this paper we present an analysis and an extensive comparison of radio communication technologies, namely Zigbee, Bluetooth and Bluetooth Low Energy, that have been proposed as likely candidates to provide wireless connectivity between body sensors and the health care system and consequently to lead the development and extended deployment of Wireless Body Area Networks. After the description of their characteristics, we concentrate on the security that these technologies offer since security is extremely important for the sensitive health care clinical information communicated and the protection of patients’ clinical information privacy.