Energy consumption is a key issue in body sensor networks (BSNs) since energy-constrained sensors monitor the vital signs of human beings in healthcare applications. In this paper, packet size optimization for BSNs has been analyzed to improve the efficiency of energy consumption. Existing studies on packet size optimization in wireless sensor networks cannot be applied to BSNs because the different operational characteristics of nodes and the channel effects of in-body and on-body propagation cannot be captured. In this paper, automatic repeat request (ARQ), forward error correction (FEC) block codes, and FEC convolutional codes have been analyzed regarding their energy efficiency. The hop-length extension technique has been applied to improve this metric with FEC block codes. The theoretical analysis and the numerical evaluations reveal that exploiting FEC schemes improves the energy efficiency, increases the optimal payload packet size, and extends the hop length for all scenarios for in-body and on-body propagation.