Integrating WSN with Web Services for Patients

Record Management using RFID

M. Ananthi

M.R. Sumalatha

Department of Information Technology

Sairam Engineering College, Anna University
Chennai, India
[email protected]

Department of Information Technology

MIT Campus, Anna University
Chennai, India.
[email protected]

they can be reused. Applications in SOA are built based on

services. A service is an implementation of well-defined
business functionality, and such services can then be consumed
by clients in different applications or business processes.
Standardized Service Contracts are Loose Coupling,
Abstraction,
Reusability,
Autonomy,
Statelessness,
Discoverability and Composability. Based on these Service
Oriented principles, it is possible to inter operate sensor
networks with web services and to access the information from
sensor networks will be efficient. An easy-to use, smart user
interface has to be developed that should be context-aware.

Abstract Web service supports interoperability for

collecting, storing, manipulating and retrieving data from
heterogeneous environments. The Wireless Sensor Network is a
resource-constrained device, which is low cost, low power and
small in size and used in various applications such as industrial
control & monitoring, environmental sensing, health care, etc.
The main intent is to design a middleware that hides the
complexity of accessing the sensor network environment and
developing an application for sensor web enablement. This
concept holds great importance because integrating wireless
sensor network into IP-based systems are still a challenging issue.
It is very important to collect patients details during the
emergency period. To create a web service to manage patients
personal data with the help of Radio Frequency Identification
Tag (RFID), Web Service is dedicated to collecting, storing,
manipulating, and making available clinical information.
Context-aware services are needed for searching information
more accurately and to produce highly impeccable output.

II.

Several Service Oriented middleware approaches for WSN

are available. Different approaches have different
characteristics and they do have lots of pros and cons [10].
Some middleware tools support various design principles [7].
Middleware challenges for WSN in terms of hardware
resources, changes in network topology & size, Heterogeneity,
Network organization, Application knowledge, Security, QoS
and Integration with other systems discussed. Several SOM
approaches for WSN are StreaMWare, USEME, Sensor Web
2.0, OASiS,B-VIS, MiSense, SOMDM,(SI)2, SOA-MM,
MidCASE, ubiSOAP, SensorsMW, SOM architecture for
WSN, DySSCo, TinySOA [2]. SWE defined by OGC are also
discussed. A reusable, scalable, extensible and inter operable
SO Sensor web architecture designed. TOSSIM simulator &
SWE specifications based on XML, SOAP & WSDL technique
used. Performance & Response time with various clients
analyzed[13]. In this paper, the energy saving mechanism was
not considered and there was a performance bottleneck while
using TinyDB. In [5] five challenges for the semantic sensor
web were given as abstraction Level, QoS, Integration &
fusion of data, Identification & Location of relevant sensorbased data sources and rapid development of applications.
Applying semantic-based approaches to Sensor web challenges
discussed. Event identification & management with sensor
data, improved sensor network management using semantic
techniques are discussed as future work. This is an ongoing
project referred in www.Sensorgrid4env.eu. In [1] REST
interfaces for each SWE service using the JSON data format
for message exchange developed.
The results and
measurements have shown the effectiveness in terms of file
size reduction, communication and response times. Data

KeywordsService-Oriented Middleware (SOM), RFID,

Semantic Web Service (SWS), Sensor Web Enablement (SWE),
Context-aware

I.

INTRODUCTION

The government agencies, universities and industries are

focused on integrating sensor networks with web services for
military and non-military applications such as industrial control
and monitoring, home automation, environmental sensing,
infrastructure security, traffic control and healthcare
applications. The design of middle-level primitives between
the WSN and the targeted applications still raises technical
challenges. A middleware is required for wireless sensor
networks to treat a huge amount of information from sensor
nodes. However, the use of middleware and specialized
application services could be a big hobble for the portability of
heterogeneous hardware and software platforms. One of the
emerging approaches is Service-Oriented Middleware. A
service-oriented architecture is essentially a collection of
services. These services communicate with each other. The
communication can involve either simple data passing or it
could involve two or more services coordinating some activity.
Some means of connecting services to each other is needed.
SOA is an architectural style for building software applications
that use services available in a network such as the web. It
promotes loose coupling between software components so that

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978-1-4673-4529-3/12/$31.00 2012
IEEE

RELATED WORK

605

transmission time is analyzed between JSON/REST VS

SOAP/XML VS XML/REST. It was proved that less
transmission time achieved for JSON/REST. In [6] the
challenges of IP on sensor networks are surveyed. The header
overhead, addressing scheme, limited bandwidth and limited
energy are still a challenging issue. Here, header compression
technique and layered approach are implemented. But,
dynamic routing is not followed, no easy-of-use and non autoconfigured. In [8], context-Aware Middleware for Pervasive
Elderly Homecare (CAMPH), 16 activities of patients such as
location-based emergency response, anomalous daily activity
detection, etc., are monitored and measured. This is based on
context-query processing and context-aware service
management. 98% of accuracy is achieved only for nonoverlapping activities which include number of missed
detection of activities and worst performance during
overlapping activities. So, context-aware service management
has to be improved. In RFID-based Real-time Hospital Patient
Management System (HPMS) [3], patients are identified by
reading an RFID tag. Username and Password are given to
patients based on their name and random code. Currently BKe-hospital requires a PID and a digital photo of the patient to
help the doctor identify the patient being treated to avoid
possible errors. They are still investigating the use of bar code
technology to create the PID. The patient's card will have a bar
code and the medical staff will use a bar code reader to
determine the PID. This will make the system more efficient
and reduce potential errors during logins. In addition, when
patients would login to the system to see their medical record,
along with a Username and Password, the system will ask the
patients to enter in the barcode number on their card and there
is no context aware search for the patients data. Added to
these features information about the post-mortem details which
are still dependent on circuitous paper based technique can be
made available through web based technique. Manual paperbased storage methods, though it is simple and easy to exercise,
it has a great debacle of inefficiency in maintaining large
amount of data. Moreover sharing and saving data becomes a
tedious task. But, Mercury lives [4] does not support in
providing real time data. Patients personal health records and
the results of the analyses of the data gathered right from the
initial stage to up to date are stored efficiently. In [2] this
survey paper, middleware challenges for WSN, Service
Oriented Middleware requirements for WSN and various
approaches for WSN were discussed. All the functional and
non-functional requirements were represented for different
services. Reliability, Performance, Security and QoS must be
supported by Service Oriented Computing (SOC).
III. AMALGAMATION OF WSN WITH WEB
SERVICES
The proposed scheme is to integrate Wireless Sensor
Networks with web services using context-aware service
oriented middleware. A lightweight middleware is to be
implemented to support web-based applications over Wireless
Sensor Network (WSN) and to create an interface so that the
users can find their required services. It is proposed to design a
user-friendly smart interface that provides contextual
awareness of the device by incorporating semantic networks in
designing the interface for efficient service identification,

606

communication and response time so as to improve the

performance and scalability.
A. Semantic-based Service-Oriented Sensor Web Architecture
The proposed scheme is based on the SOA (Service
Oriented Architecture) and SWS (Semantic Web Services) that
offers flexibility and dynamism so as to attain openness,
flexibility and adaptability.
The architecture for semantic
based SWE is given below in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1. Semantic based SWE

The interoperability for accessing and make use of sensor

data is possible via service-oriented web services. SWE [16]
has five primary specifications, Sensor Model Language
(Sensor ML), Observation & Measurement (O&M), Sensor
Collection Service (SCS), Sensor Planning Service (SPS) and
Web Notification Service (WNS). These specifications are
used [11] for interfaces, protocols, and encodings that enable
the use of sensor data and services. To access the services
provided by WSN, web services provide interoperability to
represent the service interface, however they are distributed.
For efficient accessing of information, Semantic Web Service
(SWS) approach is used. As a testing phase of integrating web
service with resource constrained devices (Sensors, RFID, and
actuators) RFID has chosen to retrieve the patients record.
Because, maintaining patient information instead of medical
prescription record paper-based management, web-based
access to a patients record can be obtained only by reading
patient id using RFID.
B. Patients Record Management using RFID
Presently the medical prescription reports given by the
doctors are still the age old paper based technique. During
critical stage, when a patient wants to meet the doctor and
he/she does not bring the medical report to the hospital, they
need to take the age old paper based prescription report during
emergency state and it is a tedious task especially during an
emergency situation as it is not possible to search old
prescription report and carry the same. As a result of this
circuitous task proper medication becomes a difficult thing to
decipher and as a result only the first aid treatment is given.
Again, either the patient or his family members need to
explain the past history details of the patient information. It is
not an easy task for the family members to explain the entire

2013 3rd IEEE International Advance Computing Conference (IACC)

patient history with proper details at a critical stage added to

this it is also difficult to remember the patients entire history.
The proposed systems approach is fully based on Web based
access of patient health record using the unique identification
technique with RFID tag. This is to automate patients record
management through the use of RF identification (RFID) tags.
Security to the details collected from the patient is provided by
Unique Technique method of Radio Frequency Identification
tag, along with the digital photo of the authenticated person to
verify it and the session is maintained throughout the access of
the user role to give the right diagnosis at the right time and to
prevent from any fault detection. The patients personal data
and medical prescription report assists in maintaining up-todate information and the prescription can be viewed by the
doctor/patient even during emergency state. If the doctor
wishes to view particularly the recent reports, a search for the
particular record is obtained by using semantic search. The
patient health record is maintained from the prescription report
up-to-date and the same can be viewed by the patients. Here
they have the options only to view it and the patient cannot
edit the history of records. In emergency state, if the doctors
want to search particularly recent prescription report the
search for the particular record is obtained. From that report, a
doctor can suggest whether the patient need to take high doses
of medicines or not in a critical state, instead of searching
from the start to date. Apart from this, the doctor can give
post-mortem details by web based technique. The Web-Based
access of Patient medical report with authorized access makes
more effective and efficient to get the information at during
emergency period along with semantic search of the data. The
security is provided by the RFID tag, along with the digital
photo of the authenticated person to verify it and to give the
right diagnosis at the right time and to prevent from any fault
detection. For immediate access patients data, with the help
of semantic search particular details in the record are obtained
from the database. While Remote Accessing, the patient can
only view the records and they dont have their option to edit
their prescription report or History of Records. By this way the
security is provided from the end-user side.

mortem report for a particular person. Added to it, this

technique it is easy for getting death certificates, as the records
are not deleted from the database.

Context aware search of Patients Recent Report

During emergency times if the patient needs immediate
first aid diagnosis treatment, then the doctor needs to search
all the details which have been prescribed for patients
previously starting from first. To avoid this tedious task, in the
proposed system the doctor has options like entering a
particular period of time. So that it is more useful for giving a
diagnosis, because doctor can decide whether they can
increase or decrease their dosage at the time of the critical
state. Apart from this doctor can also view patients recent
health records like Hemoglobin Report, X-Ray Report, CTScan Report, Ultra Sound Report etc., This describes how the
doctor insert, view the patient report, In a similar way, a
doctor can enter post-mortem details of the person.

As an initial phase, an application for the patient record

management system was developed to maintain patient records.
This is a testing mechanism to integrate web based application
with a sensing device RFID. Each patient is provided with an
RFID tag. The unique id is read and the patient history is
loaded into the system. Here the testing is in a small scale
environment to see how the sensor data is integrated with the
system and to check the efficiency of the system for an
augmented, effective and efficient access to the patients health
record along with the secured web based access of Unique
Identification Method.

On-line post-mortem details

Till now patients post-mortem details follows paper based
technique. There is a chance of giving a false statement or
losing the paper. So by using a doctors identification
technique one can know which doctor has given the post-

C.

Unique-Id based Record Storage

RFID [16] is a tracking technology used to identify and

authenticate tags that are applied to any identification
technique that make use of radio waves to facilitate data
transmission through the portable device known as a tag that is
read with the help of RFID reader; and process it as per the
needs of an application. Information transmitted with the help
of tag offers location or identification. For authenticated secure
access we have chosen Passive Radio Frequency Identification
Tag also known as Smart Card. The Reader consists of an
adapter, integrated circuit of EM4095 and MAX232 level
converter. The input power supply for the RFID Reader kit is
obtained by using an adapter, which tends to adapt according
to the need of the RFID Reader kit. In the Web based
application the patients, Lab Physician, Doctor Modules are
integrated along with the authenticated technique and validated
from the Database. The system architecture for patient record
management is given in Fig. 2

Fig. 2. Patient Record Management System using RFID

IV. TESTING & IMPLEMENTATION

For each role in the hospital the Unique Smart Card is

given to them. This helps the patients by avoiding the
responsibility of bringing the Medical prescription reports
during normal or emergency visits. The only thing they need to
carry is the Passive Smart Tag which is very small and
compact in size. The use of Smart card is when there are
thousands of patients in the hospital and each patients record
must be maintained very safe while going for web based
access. At web based access user name & password will not be
so much secured and there may be fault detection by this

2013 3rd IEEE International Advance Computing Conference (IACC)

607

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

V.

Fig 3. It has proven that time delay is reduced in the Unique-id

based technique.
Time Delay

Response Time(min)

technique. With the help of Unique Identification Tag which is

given for each patient the patients history can be maintained in
a more effective manner and there cannot be misguiding of
entering false details in another patients record, instead of
entering in his record details. When patients shows the smart
card in front of the reader, the reader will sense the Radio
Frequency data sent at 125 KHz and the data sent to the system
with help of a Max232 Level converter which maintains the
corresponding system voltage to that of the reader and viceversa. Finally the Unique data are sent from the Hardware
device to the system. The communication for the hardware kit
and system interface is done by the serial cable RS232. Finally,
the received data is tested in the system with the help of hyper
terminal communications. Once, it is tested, then to access in
the web page the coding is written in ASP.NET. Initially the
Port Identifier is set along with driver connection method and
then it verifies with the default port list. If the port Id exists,
then the tag creates instance for the new UserID number set
by the Database. For each patient, the corresponding Unique
Identification number is generated from the web page.

Parameters

Very Low

Moderate

Time Delay
patient Waiting
duration
Storage
Capacity
Ability to Share

Very
time

Long time

Unique
Identification with
Web Based
Technique
High-with help of
smart card technique.
Affordable time

Poor

High

High

Poor

High-not secured

High

Investment Cost

Less

Moderate

Affordable Rate

Average

Good

Improved

Security

Quality of
services
Scalability

long

Web Based
Technique

Time Delay

6
4
2
0

Nil

Yes

Yes

Varied

Semantic Search

Sensor to web
application

Nil

Mostly GUI
panel

Web Based Access

User friendly
environment

No

Yes

Improved with help

of context based
technique

Duration of time required to retrieve the patients record for

existing and proposed technique is analyzed and plotted in

WebBased

PaperBased

Fig. 3. Duration of time recorded for various techniques

The maximum storage capacity for different techniques is

shown in Fig. 4.

size(GB)

Storage capacity
4.5
4
3.5
3
2.5
2
1.5
1
0.5
0

Storage
capacity

PaperBased

WebBased

Unique-Id
Based

Various Techniques

Fig. 4. Storage Capacity of Patient Records

VI.

Search of Data

608

Various Techniques

COMPARISON OF PAPER BASED, WEB-BASED &

UNIQUE-ID BASED
Paper
Based
Technique

10

Unique-Id
Based

Using the above technique, a complete detail of the patient

information can be maintained in a secured manner. It is easier
and less complex providing details for patient understanding.
Patients waiting time for a check-up and prior investigation of
patient history is reduced. Storage cost is much less than the
equivalent number of paper records. Patients Prescription
Report is always up-to-date. The analysis of existing methods
with Unique-Id based method is compared and given in the
Table I.
TABLE I.

12

CONCLUSION

The intense analyses of the current trends, illustrates

opportunities and challenges for designing a middleware which
acts as an interface between Wireless sensor networks and IPbased systems. Hence we proposed to design a middleware that
is intended to meet the requirements of wireless sensor
networks and help the users to find their desired services. One
of the main objectives in developing such type of system is it
should be easy-to-use, with expressive programming interface,
meeting different sensor network application challenges, with
limited hardware and QoS requirements. The middleware
designed is based on context-based information extraction and
semantic approach which provides better results compared with
existing systems.
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