  In chronic diseases, obtaining a correct diagnosis and providing the most
appropriate treatments often is not enough to guarantee an improvement of the
clinical condition of a patient. Poor adherence to medical prescriptions
constitutes one of the main causes preventing achievement of therapeutic goals.
This is generally true especially for certain diseases and specific target
patients, such as children. An engaging and entertaining technology can be
exploited in support of clinical practices to achieve better health outcomes.
Our assumption is that a gamified session with a humanoid robot, compared to
the usual methodologies for therapeutic education, can be more incisive in
learning the correct inhalation procedure in children affected by asthma. In
this perspective, we describe an interactive module implemented on the Pepper
robotic platform and the setting of a study that was planned in 2020 to be held
at the Pneumoallergology Pediatric clinic of CNR in Palermo. The study was
canceled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Our long-term goal is to assess, by
means of a qualitative-quantitative survey plan, the impact of such an
educational action, evaluating possible improvement in the adherence to the
treatment.
