Flexible Macroblock Ordering for Context-Aware Ultrasound Video Transmission over Mobile WiMAX

The most recent network technologies are enabling a variety of new applications, thanks to the provision of increased bandwidth and better management of Quality of Service. Nevertheless, telemedical services involving multimedia data are still lagging behind, due to the concern of the end users, that is, clinicians and also patients, about the low quality provided. Indeed, emerging network technologies should be appropriately exploited by designing the transmission strategy focusing on quality provision for end users. Stemming from this principle, we propose here a context-aware transmission strategy for medical video transmission over WiMAX systems. Context, in terms of regions of interest (ROI) in a specific session, is taken into account for the identification of multiple regions of interest, and compression/transmission strategies are tailored to such context information. We present a methodology based on H.264 medical video compression and Flexible Macroblock Ordering (FMO) for ROI identification. Two different unequal error protection methodologies, providing higher protection to the most diagnostically relevant data, are presented

Real-time transmission of panoramic images for a telepresence wheelchair

© 2015 IEEE. This paper proposes an approach to transmit panoramic images in real-time for a telepresence wheelchair. The system can provide remote monitoring and assistive assistance for people with disabilities. This study exploits technological advancement in image processing, wireless communication networks, and healthcare systems. High resolution panoramic images are extracted from the camera which is mounted on the wheelchair. The panoramic images are streamed in real-time via a wireless network. The experimental results show that streaming speed is up to 250 KBps. The subjective quality assessments show that the received images are smooth during the streaming period. In addition, in terms of the objective image quality evaluation the average peak signal-to-noise ratio of the reconstructed images is measured to be 39.19 dB which reveals high quality of images

Multilayer perceptron neural network-based QoS-aware, content-aware and device-aware QoE prediction model : a proposed prediction model for medical ultrasound streaming over small cell networks

This paper presents a QoS-aware, content-aware and device-aware non-intrusive medical QoE (m-QoE) prediction model over small cell networks. The proposed prediction model utilises a Multilayer Perceptron (MLP) neural network to predict m-QoE. It also acts as a platform to maintain and optimise the acceptable diagnostic quality through a device-aware adaptive video streaming mechanism. The proposed model is trained for an unseen dataset of input variables such as QoS, content features, and display device characteristics, to produce an output value in the form of m-QoE (i.e. MOS). The efficiency of the proposed model is validated through subjective tests carried by medical experts. The prediction accuracy obtained via the correlation coefficient and Root Mean-Square-Error (RMSE) indicates that the proposed model succeeds in measuring m-QoE closer to the visual perception of the medical experts. Furthermore, we have addressed the following two main research questions: (1) How significant is ultrasound video content type in determining m-QoE? and (2) How much of a role does the screen size and device resolution play in medical experts’ diagnostic experience? The former is answered through the content classification of ultrasound video sequences based on their spatio-temporal features, by including these features in the proposed prediction model, and validating their significance through medical experts’ subjective ratings. The latter is answered by conducting a novel subjective experiment of the ultrasound video sequences across multiple devices

Remote hearing aid fitting: tele-audiology in the context of Brazilian Public Policy

INTRODUÇÃO: O governo brasileiro atualmente credencia cerca de 140 centros especializados para adaptações de aparelhos de amplificação sonora individual via SUS. Adaptações à distância através da internet podem permitir maior eficiência na prestação deste serviço e com maiores chances de aceitação por parte do paciente do SUS. OBJETIVOS: Descrever o caso de adaptação à distância realizado entre duas cidades, com revisão da literatura. MÉTODO: Equipamentos de informática e de tecnologia da informação, programador universal, aparelhos de amplificação sonora individual. ESTUDO DE CASO: Uma fonoaudióloga lotada num centro especializado introduziu a um centro remoto (distância de 200 km) um novo aparelho de amplificação sonora individual e seu programa de adaptação. O centro remoto assistiu a adaptação de dois pacientes em sua clínica, realizando voluntariamente a adaptação do terceiro paciente. Todo o procedimento foi realizado através da internet, contando com recursos de áudio e vídeo em todos os procedimentos. RESULTADOS: Três pacientes foram adaptados à distância. Três fonoaudiólogas receberam treinamento à distância de como adaptar aparelhos auditivos. CONCLUSÃO: Foi possível adaptar AASI à distância, além de prover treinamento e habilitar um centro remoto na adaptação de um novo aparelho de amplificação sonora individual e de seu programa de adaptação. Tal procedimento pode ser útil ao governo na condução de políticas públicas da saúde auditiva

Satellite Communications

This study is motivated by the need to give the reader a broad view of the developments, key concepts, and technologies related to information society evolution, with a focus on the wireless communications and geoinformation technologies and their role in the environment. Giving perspective, it aims at assisting people active in the industry, the public sector, and Earth science fields as well, by providing a base for their continued work and thinking

Telemedicine

Telemedicine is a rapidly evolving field as new technologies are implemented for example for the development of wireless sensors, quality data transmission. Using the Internet applications such as counseling, clinical consultation support and home care monitoring and management are more and more realized, which improves access to high level medical care in underserved areas. The 23 chapters of this book present manifold examples of telemedicine treating both theoretical and practical foundations and application scenarios

WEHST: Wearable Engine for Human-Mediated Telepresence

This dissertation reports on the industrial design of a wearable computational device created to enable better emergency medical intervention for situations where electronic remote assistance is necessary. The design created for this doctoral project, which assists practices by paramedics with mandates for search-and-rescue (SAR) in hazardous environments, contributes to the field of human-mediated teleparamedicine (HMTPM). Ethnographic and industrial design aspects of this research considered the intricate relationships at play in search-and-rescue operations, which lead to the design of the system created for this project known as WEHST: Wearable Engine for Human-Mediated Telepresence. Three case studies of different teams were carried out, each focusing on making improvements to the practices of teams of paramedics and search-and-rescue technicians who use combinations of ambulance, airplane, and helicopter transport in specific chemical, biological, radioactive, nuclear and explosive (CBRNE) scenarios. The three paramedicine groups included are the Canadian Air Force 442 Rescue Squadron, Nelson Search and Rescue, and the British Columbia Ambulance Service Infant Transport Team. Data was gathered over a seven-year period through a variety of methods including observation, interviews, examination of documents, and industrial design. The data collected included physiological, social, technical, and ecological information about the rescuers. Actor-network theory guided the research design, data analysis, and design synthesis. All of this leads to the creation of the WEHST system. As identified, the WEHST design created in this dissertation project addresses the difficulty case-study participants found in using their radios in hazardous settings. As the research identified, a means of controlling these radios without depending on hands, voice, or speech would greatly improve communication, as would wearing sensors and other computing resources better linking operators, radios, and environments. WEHST responds to this need. WEHST is an instance of industrial design for a wearable “engine” for human-situated telepresence that includes eight interoperable families of wearable electronic modules and accompanying textiles. These make up a platform technology for modular, scalable and adaptable toolsets for field practice, pedagogy, or research. This document details the considerations that went into the creation of the WEHST design

Mathematical modelling of end-to-end packet delay in multi-hop wireless networks and their applications to qos provisioning

This thesis addresses the mathematical modelling of end-to-end packet delay for Quality of Service (QoS) provisioning in multi-hop wireless networks. The multi-hop wireless technology increases capacity and coverage in a cost-effective way and it has been standardised in the Fourth-Generation (4G) standards. The effective capacity model approximates end-to-end delay performances, including Complementary Cumulative Density Function (CCDF) of delay, average delay and jitter. This model is first tested using Internet traffic trace from a real gigabit Ethernet gateway. The effective capacity model is developed based on single-hop and continuous-time communication systems but a multi-hop wireless system is better described to be multi-hop and time-slotted. The thesis extends the effective capacity model by taking multi-hop and time-slotted concepts into account, resulting in two new mathematical models: the multi-hop effective capacity model for multi-hop networks and the mixed continuous/discrete-time effective capacity model for time-slotted networks. Two scenarios are considered to validate these two effective capacity-based models based on ideal wireless communications (the physical-layer instantaneous transmission rate is the Shannon channel capacity): 1) packets traverse multiple wireless network devices and 2) packets are transmitted to or received from a wireless network device every Transmission Time Interval (TTI). The results from these two scenarios consistently show that the new mathematical models developed in the thesis characterise end-to-end delay performances accurately. Accurate and efficient estimators for end-to-end packet delay play a key role in QoS provisioning in modern communication systems. The estimators from the new effective capacity-based models are directly tested in two systems, faithfully created using realistic simulation techniques: 1) the IEEE 802.16-2004 networks and 2) wireless tele-ultrasonography medical systems. The results show that the estimation and simulation results are in good agreement in terms of end-to-end delay performances

Performance evaluation of cooperation strategies for m-health services and applications

Health telematics are becoming a major improvement for patients’ lives, especially for disabled, elderly, and chronically ill people. Information and communication technologies have rapidly grown along with the mobile Internet concept of anywhere and anytime connection. In this context, Mobile Health (m-Health) proposes healthcare services delivering, overcoming geographical, temporal and even organizational barriers. Pervasive and m-Health services aim to respond several emerging problems in health services, including the increasing number of chronic diseases related to lifestyle, high costs in existing national health services, the need to empower patients and families to self-care and manage their own healthcare, and the need to provide direct access to health services, regardless the time and place. Mobile Health (m- Health) systems include the use of mobile devices and applications that interact with patients and caretakers. However, mobile devices have several constraints (such as, processor, energy, and storage resource limitations), affecting the quality of service and user experience. Architectures based on mobile devices and wireless communications presents several challenged issues and constraints, such as, battery and storage capacity, broadcast constraints, interferences, disconnections, noises, limited bandwidths, and network delays. In this sense, cooperation-based approaches are presented as a solution to solve such limitations, focusing on increasing network connectivity, communication rates, and reliability. Cooperation is an important research topic that has been growing in recent years. With the advent of wireless networks, several recent studies present cooperation mechanisms and algorithms as a solution to improve wireless networks performance. In the absence of a stable network infrastructure, mobile nodes cooperate with each other performing all networking functionalities. For example, it can support intermediate nodes forwarding packets between two distant nodes. This Thesis proposes a novel cooperation strategy for m-Health services and applications. This reputation-based scheme uses a Web-service to handle all the nodes reputation and networking permissions. Its main goal is to provide Internet services to mobile devices without network connectivity through cooperation with neighbor devices. Therefore resolving the above mentioned network problems and resulting in a major improvement for m-Health network architectures performances. A performance evaluation of this proposal through a real network scenario demonstrating and validating this cooperative scheme using a real m-Health application is presented. A cryptography solution for m-Health applications under cooperative environments, called DE4MHA, is also proposed and evaluated using the same real network scenario and the same m-Health application. Finally, this work proposes, a generalized cooperative application framework, called MobiCoop, that extends the incentive-based cooperative scheme for m-Health applications for all mobile applications. Its performance evaluation is also presented through a real network scenario demonstrating and validating MobiCoop using different mobile applications