Aflac toy robot for kids faces cancer with real feelings
Aflac has teamed up with robotics toy company Sproutel to create My Special Aflac Duck, a technology that offers emotional support to kids with cancer.
Kids can feed, bathe and even administer chemotherapy to the ducks that can respond to touch.
“Medical play can be really therapeutic,” Sproutel CEO Aaron Horowitz told FOX Business on “Mornings with Maria.” “It gives them this feeling of control. They have this friend that’s going through this treatment right alongside me.”
The duck has five touch sensors that allows it to respond and move in a life-like way. When one of the sensors taps the ducks chest, it behaves with that feeling to help children communicate their own feelings.
“A nurse or a doctor will walk into the child’s room and they’ll say, ‘How do you think your friend the duck feels about getting chemo today?’ And it’s sometimes easier for the child to answer for their friend than it is for themselves,” said Horowitz.
Aflac has hailed itself as a pioneer of cancer insurance with the expansion of its 22-year commitment to childhood cancer with the launch of the Childhood Cancer Campaign, which aims provide innovative support for the thousands of children newly diagnosed with cancer each year in America.
They have donated $125 million to the research and treatment of pediatric cancer over that time, Aflac Senior Vice President Catherine Hernandez-Blades added.