QoS based telemedicine technologies for rural healthcare emergencies

Telemedicine systems are becoming prevalent in today's healthcare scenarios, especially in India where a large portion of the population resides in remote and rural regions where availability of specialty healthcare is scant. Many such telemedicine system implementations can be found in the existing literature. Since critical data are being transmitted over these networks, the reliability of these systems is highly important. This paper discusses about the quality of service (QoS) requirements for achieving reliability for such systems. The paper discusses the importance and acceptance of such rescue vehicles which are equipped with the telemedicine facilities. This involves the role of paramedic assistance, multiple access technologies along with acquisition and remission of vital parameters such as electrocardiogram (ECG), blood pressure (BP), pulse rate (PR) etc. to a specialist doctor at the remote hospital. A comprehensive survey has been done among the various stakeholders of the proposed system. The paper focuses on the need for the QoS mechanisms in the proposed telemedicine system for the rural rescue and health care emergencies.