Abstract

Recent advances in mobile communication, mobile cloud, and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies are transforming various vertical application domains. Particularly eHealth services are expected to take advantage of those enabling technologies to evolve towards remote, patient-centric, and individualized care. In this work, we study the roles of the fifth generation mobile technology (5G) as an integrator for various enablers to create a converged infrastructure for future eHealth applications. We first analyze high-impact and industry-driven eHealth use cases and identify challenges. We then propose a reference architecture for a future eHealth infrastructure, which is a fusion of cloud, edge, IoT, and other emerging technologies. Finally, to evaluate the proposed architecture, we implement a remote patient monitoring service comprising the architecture components and enablers, i.e., mobile device sensors and distributed intelligent data analysis. The evaluation shows an effective integration of artificial intelligence (AI) components to support novel eHealth applications.