Cooperative Mobile High-Speed and Personal Area Networks for the Provision of Pervasive E-Health Services

The present paper studies the performance of a high-speed third-generation (3.5G) networking technology (Enhanced Uplink), in collaboration with well known personal area networks (i.e. Zigbee and Bluetooth) and wireless local area network (WLAN) technology, for delivering pervasive healthcare applications. The association of personal and local area networks along with the 3.5G network is a critical factor for successful development of pervasive e-health services perceived by end-users. In this paper, we propose a methodology for performance assessment based on the joint uplink transmission of voice, real-time video and biomedical data, such us electrocardiogram, vital signals and heart sounds. Various scenarios were concerned for point of care applications in real-time and near-real-time modes and in random locations, where no other system but 3.5G is available. The accomplishment of quality of service (QoS) was explored through the delay and the jitter of the networks´ parameters, attributing the joint network system for best performance in the context of the desired e-health services.