Personal health and fitness
ANT (+) standard, but in the future increasingly BLE are ruling gyms pulse rate meters
In gyms pulse rate meters are widespread. The transmission between the chest belt and a display unit in the shape of a wristwatch (sports watch) is wireless, being still mainly under the ANT (+) standard, but in the future, increasingly, via BLE. With the appropriate underwater wireless solution, divers can also see live information on their heart rate, oxygen saturation, etc., in addition to standard information such as current depth, (remaining) bottom-time, tank pressure etc., on their own dive computers. In the professional medical field, there are also many applications that use a data connection via an RF link. Some of these applications are not feasible at all without RF technology. A good example is a camera capsule for the examination of the small intestine. The patient swallows the miniature camera as a pill. During its journey through the small intestine, which cannot be viewed from the inside using conventional non-surgical methods, the mini camera continuously takes photographs, which are then transmitted by radio in the 400 MHz band through the abdominal wall to the outside. The next generation of these ‘pill’ cameras will even be controllable from the outside using RF technology so that at this stage in the development there will also be a bi-directional data transfer through the abdominal wall. Another good example of RF applications in medicine is the sticker or patch sensor, which is stuck to the skin in ECG recordings and transmits data over a short range by radio to a recording box. The new all-purpose sports watches with built-in pulse rate monitor, barometer, GPS tracking and computer interface are inconceivable without RF devices.
