Evaluation of a realtime, remote monitoring telemedicine system using the Bluetooth protocol and a mobile phone network.

A generic, realtime wireless telemedicine system has been developed that uses the Bluetooth protocol and the general packet radio service for mobile phones. The system was tested on 10 healthy volunteers, by continuous monitoring of their electrocardiograms (ECGs). Under realistic conditions, the system had 96.5% uptime, a data throughput of 3.3 kbit/s, a mean packet error rate of 8.5x10(-3) packet/s and a mean packet loss rate of 8.2x10(-3) packet/s. During 24 h testing, the total average downtime was 66 min and 90% of the periods of downtime were of only 1-3 min duration. Less than 10% of the ECGs were of unacceptable quality. Thus, the generic telemedicine system showed high reliability and performance, and the design may provide a foundation for realtime monitoring in clinical practice, for example in cardiology.