IEEE802.15.6 NB portable BAN clinic and M2M international standardization

The increase of non communicable diseases (NCDs) will change the direction of health services to emphasize the role of preventive medicine in healthcare services. The first short-range medical body area network (BAN) standard IEEE802.15.6 is expected to be used for secure and user-friendly sensor devices for portable medical equipment. A BAN is an enabler for uploading medical data to a backend system for remote diagnoses and treatment. Machine-to-Machine (M2M) infrastructure is also a key technology for providing flexible and affordable services extending electronic health record (EHR) systems. This paper proposes a BAN-based portable clinic that collects health-check data from user-friendly medical devices and sensors and sends the data to a local backend server, and it evaluates the clinic in fields of actual usage. We discuss issues experienced from actual deployment of the system and focus on integrating it into upcoming healthcare M2M infrastructure to achieve affordable and dependable clinic services. We explain the components and workflow of the clinic and the system model. The system is set up at a temporary health center and has a network link to a remote medical help center. The paper concludes with our plan to introduce our system to contribute to internationally standardized preventive medicine.