HealthNet: A system for mobile and wearable health information management

Medical health care is undergoing a significant change of paradigm. Moving health care from health centers to home environments poses new challenges for acquisition, management and mobile exchange of information. The HealthNet project at RWTH Aachen University has developed a prototype which addresses these new challenges: a Body Sensor Network (BSN) collects information about the vital functions of a patient while she is in her home environment; the integration of smart textile sensors increases the acceptability of such technology; mobile communication and data management enables the exchange of health data between patients and doctors; data stream mining techniques tuned for mobile devices provide immediate feedback of the collected data to the user; and finally, advanced security and privacy features increase user acceptance and cope with legal requirements. This paper summarizes the challenges and achievements in the development of this prototype.