Summary
 Introduction
 The protocols developed by ITU-T
 E-Health protocol
 Architecture of e-Health
 X.th1
 X.th2 to X.th6
 Common Alerting Protocol
 Conclusion
Introduction
E-Health is an area rich and complex, so safety
is an essential element in this type of
technology because of the sensitivity of the
data
transmitted.
Standard X.th offers this possibility of data
transport including safety.
The protocols developed by ITU-T
Two protocols for e-Health and protection:
 E-Health protocol X.th series (X.th1 to X.th6).
 Common Alerting Protocol X.1303.
E-Health protocol
The series of Recommendations contain:
o X.th1: generic recommendation.
o X.th2 to X.th6: specific recommendations.
Architecture of e-Health
Well endowed
clinic in an urban
area with expertise
Consultant /
Surgeon
Local medical team
(probably in a mobile
van) in another
country or rural area
Medical support
team
Video, surgical
manipulator
Surgical
equipments
Voice
Voice
Mobile /
satellite
X.th1
• The framework
• The protocol is open and extensible :
it contains several categories of exchange
o it provides security with encryption and
integrity of data.
o
Definition of objects
 Defines information object classes to defined objects
associated to:
•
•
•
•
•
Patients
Observers
Laboratories
Medical devices
Medical insurances
•
•
•
•
•
Medical staff
Pharmaceutical staff
Drug manufacturers
Medical software
Data records (dental, DNA)
Open protocol
Each data contains two elements:
• An ASN.1 object identifier
• The data itself
Definition of messages
Three types of messages:
• Setup message
• Send-and-ack
• Interactive
Setup message
• Type of communication
• Security mechanisms
• Usage of voice and video channels
Send-and-ack session
• The sender sends a message containing E-
Health data.
• The receiver replies with either:
•
•
an acknowledgment or
an error.
Interactive session
 It defines a dialog containing multiple
steps.
 This type of session has been designed
for remote interventions.
The security
It is based on CMS (Cryptographic
Message Syntax) which is provides:
• Integrity
• Encryption
CMS : normal and signed data
id-data (OID)
id-signedData (OID)
Data
Id-data (OID)
Data
signature
CMS : encrypted data and encrypted and
signed data
id-envelopedData (OID)
id-signedData (OID)
Encrypted symmetric key
Encrypted data
id-envelopedData (OID)
Encrypted symmetric key
Encrypted-data
signature
Encoding of messages
• BER: Basic Encoding Rules
• PER: Packed Encoding Rules for narrow
bandwidth
• XER: XML Encoding Rules
X.th2 to X.th6
• X.th2: physics
• X.th3: chemistry
• X.th4: biology
• X.th5: culturology
• X.th6 psychology
Elements defined in specific parts
Each part defines:
• Table of quantities, units and symbols.
• ASN.1 information objects for quantities,
units, and symbols.
• Messages to transport the data.
Common Alerting Protocol
 Initially developed by OASIS (Organization for the
Advancement of Structured Information Standards) in
April 2004 using XML (CAP 1.0).
 In 2007, this protocol has been completed with ASN.1
definitions and adopted as an ITU-T Recommendation
for CAP 1.1 (X.1303).
Common Alerting Protocol
 CAP is a protocol for alerting people for various events.
It is open and can be adapted by definition of profiles
for local needs.
 It is compatible with emerging technology of data
transmission.
 Compatible with encryption and signature.
 Support of images and audio data.
Main information of a CAP alert
A CAP message may contain four
categories for information:
• Identification parameters
• Information parameters
• Area parameters
• Resource parameters.
Identification and information parameters
 The identification parameters specify:
• identification of the message
• sender
• date time
• alert status (actual, exercise, test,etc)
• alert type (alert, acknowledgement, etc)
 The information parameters describe the event:
• category: fire, health, safety, etc.
• event: in human-readable text
• responseType: action needed (for example evacuate)
• urgency (expected, future, etc)
• severity (extreme, minor, moderate, etc)
• certainty (likely, possible, etc)
Area and resource parameters
 The area parameters specify the geographical
area
concerned by the alert which can be defined by:
• a polygon
• a circle
• an altitude
• A maximum altitude (ceiling).
 The information resources allow addition of more
information:
• files
• URI.
Message encoding
 The ASN.1 module contains in ITU-T X.1303 can be
used with any standard encoding rules.
 Two encoding rules are particularly used:
• XER (XML encoding rules): to be compatible with XML
applications.
• PER (Packed encoding rules): useful for networks using
narrow bandwidth.
Conclusion
The protocols developed in ITU-T are
appropriate for Radioactivity safety and
security situations:
• CAP can be used to alert population of
the situation and actions to be taken.
• E-Health allows remote tests and
diagnostics and also remote prescriptions.