Energy efficient selection of spreading factor in LoRaWAN-based WBAN medical systems

• Published in: Internet of things (Amsterdam. Online) Vol. 24; p. 100896
• Main Authors: Taleb, Houssein, Andrieux, Guillaume, Nasser, Abbass, Charara, Nour
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 01.12.2023
• Subjects: Electronics; Engineering Sciences; Other; WBAN; Early warning score; Energy consumption; LPWAN; LoRa; LoRaWAN; E-health; IoT; Spreading factor
• ISSN: 2542-6605; 2542-6605
• DOI: 10.1016/j.iot.2023.100896

Recently, the Internet of Things has been leading the technological revolution in several fieldsand applications. This revolution affected healthcare services adding more value to the conceptof e-health. To improve the quality of these services, remote monitoring allows healthcareprofessionals to observe and diagnose their patients without being physically present. Sincethe spreading factor affects the energy consumption, the data rate, the receiver sensitivity andthe time on air. A monitoring healthcare system using LoRa technology is proposed on this workto adopt the data transmission in a reliable and energy-efficient way. We propose a method toselect the most convenient spreading factor based on the patients medical state. This methodtakes in consideration the distance to gateway, the packet error rate and the energy consumptionrequirements.We first determine the criticality level of the patient using the Early Warning Score system.Second, a decision about the optimal spreading factor is taken based on this level. We use amethod based on the technique for order preference by similarity to an ideal solution to selecta spreading factor. We use real data to show that the results reflect an acceptable increase inenergy consumption while applying our selection method. In contrast, the results show that theselection method reduces the error rate especially for patients with a high critical level.