title: Enhancing the Performance of Medical Implant Communication Systems through Cooperative Diversity.
abstract: Battery-operated medical implants-such as pacemakers or cardioverter-defibrillators-have already been widely used in practical telemedicine and telecare applications. However, no solution has yet been found to mitigate the effect of the fading that the in-body to off-body communication channel is subject to. In this paper, we reveal and assess the potential of cooperative diversity to combat fading-hence to improve system performance-in medical implant communication systems. In the particular cooperative communication scenario we consider, multiple cooperating receiver units are installed across the room accommodating the patient with a medical implant inside his/her body. Our investigations have shown that the application of cooperative diversity is a promising approach to enhance the performance of medical implant communication systems in various aspects such as implant lifetime and communication link reliability.
authors.affiliation: Faculty of Information Technology, Pázmány Péter Catholic University, 1083 Budapest, Hungary.
authors.forename: Barnabás
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Hegyi
authors.forename: János
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Levendovszky