Technical Considerations in Emerging Medical Body Area Network Spectrum Regulation

Medical Body Area Network (MBAN) technology provides a promising solution to improve patient care outcomes and lower healthcare costs. However, the current spectrum allocation cannot cater to increasing MBAN applications. Therefore, U.S., as well as other regions, have already been considering allocating a new spectrum for MBAN applications. In this paper we study a joint MBAN regulation proposal developed by Philips Healthcare, GE Healthcare, and AFTRCC that was recently presented to the FCC for the U.S. MBAN spectrum regulation. A brief summary of the joint proposal is firstly presented. Then the technical rationale behind the proposed parameters, such as frequency band selection, emission bandwidth limit, and transmission power limit, is discussed in detail. Link budget analysis and MBAN coexistence simulations are given to demonstrate that the proposed solution can address the requirements of MBAN application.