Abstract—In the last decade, the seminal term and concept of
“m-health” were first defined and introduced in this transactions
as “mobile computing, medical sensor, and communications tech-
nologies for healthcare.” Since that special section, the m-health
concept has become one of the key technological domains that
reflected the key advances in remote healthcare and e-health sys-
tems. The m-health is currently bringing together major academic
research and industry disciplines worldwide to achieve innova-
tive solutions in the areas of healthcare delivery and technology
sectors. From the wireless communications perspective, the cur-
rent decade is expected to bring the introduction of new wire-
less standards and network systems with true mobile broadband
and fast internet access healthcare services. These will be devel-
oped around what is currently called the fourth-generation (4G)
mobile communication systems. In this editorial paper, we will
introduce the new and novel concept of 4G health that repre-
sents the long-term evolution of m-health since the introduction
of the concept in 2004. The special section also presents a snap-
shot of the recent advances in these areas and addresses some of
the challenges and future implementation issues from the evolved
m-health perspective. It will also present some of the concepts that
can go beyond the traditional “m-health ecosystem” of the exist-
ing systems. The contributions presented in this special section
represent some of these developments and illustrate the multidisci-
plinary nature of this important and emerging healthcare delivery
concept.
Index Terms—Body area network (BAN), e-health, m-health, In-
ternet of Things (IOT), long term evolution (LTE), medical sensors,
personal area network (PAN), telemedicine, WiMAX, 4G mobile
technologies.