RFMON: devices and methods for wireless monitoring of patient vital signs through medical sensor readings from passive RFID tags

A method of monitoring physiological activity of a person, comprising the steps of:

• providing a passive wireless tag including a unique identifier, a sensor for monitoring the selected physiological activity of the person and a Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) tag coupled to the sensor, the RFID tag including a unique identifier, the passive wireless tag being configured to, when polled, generate, store and transmit a monitoring signal representative of the selected physiological activity and of the unique identifier;
• providing a plurality of uniquely identified access points configured to receive and to re-transmit the monitoring signal, the plurality of access points being geographically distributed at known locations within a predetermined area;
• providing a monitoring and processing station configured to control the plurality of uniquely identified access points over a communication network;
• adhering the passive wireless tag to the person;
• generating a polling signal to poll the passive wireless tags to cause the passive wireless tags within range of the polling signal to generate, store and transmit the monitoring signal;
• receiving the transmitted monitoring signal by one or more of the plurality of uniquely identified access points and re-transmitting the received monitoring signal over the communication network, and
• receiving the re-transmitted monitoring signal in the monitoring and processing station.