The
stumbling blocks keep piling up as white space networking struggles to get off the ground: it looks like the manufacturers of healthcare equipment are set to
join NAB in opposing the technology. Wireless medical telemetry devices like heart monitors have been operating in broadcast white spaces since the late 80s, and manufacturers like GE Healthcare say that the Microsoft- and Google-backed white space networking initiative could potentially "directly interfere" and "prevent patient monitoring." For its part, the FCC has set aside all of channel 37 for medical telemetry devices in 1998 after interference from a nearby TV station shut down the system at Baylor University Medical Center, but it wasn't mandatory, and hospitals that haven't made the switch could face millions of dollars in upgrade costs. That's not say that medical telemetry concerns are a problem that can't be solved -- the new
Google push includes a channel 37 exception, for example, and there are some other compromise solutions on the table -- but it seems like there's no end of issues for a technology that hasn't really even been
demonstrated working yet.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
MeatyPi @ Apr 28th 2008 10:05PM
"Your deck of cards missing the jack and the ace."
uclatommy @ Apr 28th 2008 10:07PM
Heart monitors be damned! Give me my gadgets in an innovation and competition driven environment!
Stem $ell @ Apr 28th 2008 10:08PM
In a white space telemetry unit, no one can hear you scream...
For2itous @ Apr 28th 2008 10:17PM
That's right sir; in this 'white space' infiltrated environment we laughingly call the cardiology department, we now refer to that box implanted in your chest as a 'pacefaker'...
dOgBOi @ Apr 28th 2008 10:28PM
Hmm, working health care monitors or ubiquitous Wi-Fi. Easy choice for me. WiFi FTW! (Ouch, is that my heart?)
Aguiluz @ Apr 28th 2008 10:46PM
Nah, I only have a pacemak---
*dies suddenly*
Charbax @ Apr 29th 2008 12:46AM
White space networking could disrupt $3 trillion telecom and $2 trillion dollar global TV, movie and music entertainment industries.
When AT&T, Verizon, all the major TV networks and not only those giants in the USA but also in the rest of the world feel threatened by a new free unlimited wireless broadband technology that can give every person access to communications and on-demand independently produced entertainment, then those multi-trillion telecom and entertainment giants are going to do whatever they can to stop that disruption. And if they can't stop it, they will do what they can to delay it and slow it down.
In the USA, the telecoms, the entertainment majors and the medicinal firms are the same corporations. They will stand together and do what they can to stop free wireless broadband from happening.
John Bogorad @ Apr 29th 2008 4:18PM
The medical device manufacturers have a point. Medical telemetry monitoring systems need a clear and clean band for transmitting heart rhythms and alarm messages to the nurses and physicians when a cardiac problem is detected. If the message doesn't get through to alert the clincal staff, the patient can die. Please don't bundle the communications/entertainment companies together with the medical device industry...very different animals!
ethana2 @ Apr 29th 2008 1:03AM
In soviet russia, hospital telemetry systems disrupt /you/.
ethana2 @ Apr 29th 2008 1:05AM
CLEAR!
Kirk @ May 1st 2008 11:11PM
A few historical facts are in order here...
The "interference" cited at Baylor Medical Center in 1998 was due to the fact that the the hospital was using its wireless monitoring devices on unlicensed frequencies that were actually part of television broadcast channel 9--which was unoccupied in Dallas until the FCC assigned the frequency to a local television station as its new Digital Television (DTV) assignment.
It was only when the station powered up its licensed transmitter on channel 9 that the problems began. Baylor and other local hospitals changed the frequencies their wireless monitoring systems were operating on and the problems were resolved. News reports at the time stated that the FCC advised hospitals and medical equipment manufacturers to ''avoid operating on occupied broadcast channels.''
The point is that there really is no such thing as "white space" frequencies--just frequencies that might be unoccupied in any given geographical area. Doesn't mean that they might be unoccupied at some point in the future! So wouldn't it make sense that your hospital's heart monitor actually operates in some spectrum that is set aside for that specific purpose?