Medical Quality of Service (m-QoS) and Quality of Experience (m-QoE) for 4G-Health Systems

Abstract

It is well known that the evolution of 4G-based mobile multimedia network systems will contribute significantly to future m-health applications that require high bandwidth, high data rates, and more critically better Quality of service and quality of experience. The key to the successful implementation of these emerging applications is the compatibility of emerging broadband wireless networks such as mobile WiMAX, HSUPA, and LTE networks with future m-health systems. Most recently, the concept of 4G-health is introduced. This is defined as the evolution of m-health towards targeted personalized medical systems with adaptable functionalities and compatibility with future 4G communications and network technologies. This new concept represents the evolution of m-health toward 4G mobility. It will have new challenges especially from the next generation of mobile communications and networks perspective and in particular from relevant quality of service and quality of experience issues. This chapter presents some of these challenges and illustrates the importance of the new concepts of medical Quality of Service (m-QoS) and medical Quality of Experience (m-QoE) for 4G-health systems. The chapter also presents a validation scenario of these concepts for medical video streaming application as a typical 4G-health scenario.