ABSTRACT
5G promises to serve the requirements of various important functions, including healthcare. Emerging healthcare applications such as remote health monitoring and remote emergency assistance have stricter QoS requirements compared to currently available applications. Mobile edge computing (MEC) is an open platform that combines network, computing, storage capacity, mobility, and application capabilities at the edge of a physically close network to the data sources. MEC improves the QoS of healthcare IoT applications by reducing the data transmission latency needed to outsource tasks. However, current MEC solutions need enhancements in resource allocation, mobility management and security techniques to support the requirements of healthcare systems. The blockchain is a promising cryptographic technology that could protect against data tampering. It could be able to address some of the security challenges presented in IoT-based healthcare systems. Furthermore, it could improve interoperability, privacy, security, reliability, and scalability of the data exchanged over healthcare IoT networks. To enable the exchange of information, healthcare IoT devices will leverage smart contracts that will then model the agreement between them as well as the integration between artificial intelligence (AI) and the blockchain will be more effective than those offered if only the blockchain is used. However, blockchain needs better scalability to support the massive real-time requirements of IoT-based healthcare systems. In this chapter, we present the possible integration between healthcare IoT devices, MEC, blockchain, and AI as a base for future healthcare systems. We also explore the latest situation, the shortcomings and the research opportunities of this integration.
