An Advanced and Secure Symbian-Based Mobile Approach for Body Sensor Networks Interaction

Abstract

The combination of body sensor networks (BSNs) and mobile devices brings a personalized health monitoring opportunity to patients and medical teams. Mobile devices may be used to process and present data collected by BSN sensors in an easy and meaningful way to users. The mobility of such systems improves patients’ quality of life, enabling continuous unobtrusive health monitoring during regular daily routine tasks. This paper presents a Symbian-powered smartphone based solution for BSN sensors data gathering, monitoring, and presentation. The systems’ sensor platform hardware provides an onboard long-term data storage module, enabling continuous data gathering even in the absence of the mobile device. The mobile device connects wirelessly to the BSN using Bluetooth technology, supporting interaction with multiple sinks. This system aims to help patients that need continuous monitoring of human bio-physiological parameters in a transparent and unobtrusive way. A case study is presented, based on a sensor for women’s core body temperature collection, enabling fertility follow up processing. The system was evaluated successfully, proving its usefulness in a real scenario. As a result, it is ready for regular use.