'My Special Aflac Duck' is a robot to help kids with cancer
One of the best gadgets at CES is a robot duck that will bring a tear to your eye and capture your heart.
- Patrick's play The Cowboy is included in the Best American Short Plays 2011-12 anthology. He co-wrote and starred in the short film Baden Krunk that won the Best Wisconsin Short Film award at the Milwaukee Short Film Festival.
My Special Aflac Duck won the 2018 CES Tech For A Better World Award.
At CES it's impossible not to see a robot . There are robots that walk, ones that pour coffee and even one that is a suitcase designed to follow you. But there is one that stands above the rest, or rather under the rest -- about knee height. It's a social robot duck designed to help children facing cancer. It's called My Special Aflac Duck.
Aflac is widely known for its zany commercials especially those with a duck that quacks the company's name. The insurance company also has a long history of supporting families facing childhood cancer and have spent over $120 million toward the cause.
Aflac approached the health and research company Sproutel which made Jerry The Bear -- a comfort companion robot for kids with type-1 diabetes. The two companies sought to design a robotic comfort toy to help kids being treated for cancer.
Sproutel spent a year exploring the journey that children, families and medical professionals take as kids face cancer and chemotherapy. Those studies and insights informed both the hardware and behavior design of My Special Aflac Duck. It's part toy, part robot and part medical device.
It has sensors that react to touch, a microphone and light sensor that adapt to different environments and adjust the duck's behavior. When you hold the duck, it is incredibly life-like with natural movements. It dances, nuzzles, and even has breath and heartbeat. When you tickle its sides it quacks happily and waggles its head. Oh, and it is also incredibly cuddly.
The adorable duck gives children control during a time when they seemingly have none. They become the duck's caretaker and can feed and bathe the duck as well as have it mirror their health care routines and even receive chemotherapy.
On the chest of the duck is a glowing E.T.-like light where kids can place one of several RFID-enabled "feeler cards" that have different emojis on them. Kids decide how the duck is feeling which is usually a reflection of how they feel. When a sad card is touched to the duck's chest, the duck droops its head and quacks sadly. A happy card makes the duck quack cheerfully and dance.
My Special Aflac Duck can receive chemotherapy making the treatment less frighting for kids.
The same chest sensor has a chemotherapy PICC line attachment which lets kids witness their friend go through the same treatment as them.
Each duck costs approximately $200 (around £150, AU$255), but Aflac will donate these robot companions at no cost to any children newly diagnosed with cancer.
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