Context-Aware Handover with Power Efficiency for u-Healthcare Service in WLAN

The IEEE has recently started to develop a standard for the wireless body area network (WBAN). Providing high mobility with guaranteed QoS over the u-healthcare network which are built from the converged WBAN and WLAN systems is a challenging task. This article proposes a context-aware mobility management framework which can support high mobility in the converged WBAN and WLAN networks. The salient feature of the approach is that in order to support seamless mobility management, the context information on the communication environment, the type of service, and the medical emergency has been utilized, while minimizing the power consumption. The service model and algorithms for the context-aware mobility management have been developed in detail. Simulations have finally been performed to show the efficiency of the proposed mechanism.