eHealth-WBAN: a study of IEEE 802.15.6 and IEEE 802.15.4 based MAC protocols

Wireless Body Area Networks (WBANs) are vital for real-time health monitoring in eHealth systems. This article presents a comprehensive comparative analysis of MAC protocols based on IEEE 802.15.6 and IEEE 802.15.4 standards, with a focus on energy efficiency, latency, reliability, and emergency data handling. We critically examine superframe structures, access mechanisms, and adaptive MAC designs, and introduce a five-dimensional framework for protocol evaluation. Our study identifies key limitations in existing solutions-such as lack of support for emergency traffic and mobility adaptation-and outlines future research directions for developing intelligent, QoS-aware, and energy-efficient MAC protocols tailored to heterogeneous WBAN environments.