Abstract
The articles in this special section examine information and communication technologies for healthcare applications. With the development of myriad networked technologies and services, "connected healthcare" is getting tremendous attention from industry, academia, governments, and the healthcare community. Enabling networked services and technology (cloud computing, fog computing, mobile health technology, mobile edge computing, etc.) can play a significant role in connected healthcare systems by offering better insight into heterogeneous healthcare content to support affordable and high-quality patient care. While researchers have been making advances in the study of networked technologies for healthcare services, little attention has been given to making connected healthcare services cost effective and affordable. Connected healthcare has the potential to revolutionize many aspects of healthcare for our society.