Medical Applications of Wireless Body Area Networks

Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs) provide efficient communication solutions to the ubiquitous healthcare systems. Health monitoring, telemedicine, military, interactive entertainment, and portable audio/video systems are some of the applications where WBANs can be used. The miniaturized sensors together with advance micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) technology create a WBAN that continuously monitors the health condition of a patient. This paper presents a comprehensive discussion on the applications of WBANs in smart healthcare systems. We highlight a number of projects that enable WBANs to provide unobtrusive long-term healthcare monitoring with real-time updates to the health center. In addition, we list many potential medical applications of a WBAN including epileptic seizure warning, glucose monitoring, and cancer detection.

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