"It's nice of you to laugh, like spring flowers..." I think everyone has been brainwashed by this song recently. If you want to smile well, you must have neat teeth. Nowadays, 3D printing invisible braces are becoming more and more popular instead of metal ones. Some people want to have orthodontic treatment, but they don't want to wear steel braces because of their uneven teeth or the influence of occupation or abnormal teeth on their appearance. In this case, orthodontists will recommend invisible braces. According to relevant data, by 2026, the global market for invisible orthotics will reach 8.2 billion US dollars.

Some people have uneven teeth, or are affected by the occupation or the influence of abnormal teeth on the beauty, and want to have orthodontic treatment, but they don't want to wear steel braces. In this case, orthodontists will recommend invisible braces.

Invisible braces are very dependent on 3D technology. Both the 3D dynamic design software of orthodontic scheme and the 3D printer for making dental molds belong to 3D technology.

The 20-year history of invisible orthodontic treatment (invisible orthodontic treatment without brackets) is completely based on 3D technology. The maturity of 3D printing technology provides a precise dental model prototype for the invisible braces, which provides a reliable technical guarantee for the invisible braces. 3D printing continues to play a key role in this segment as a way to produce customized invisible socket models on which thermoforming takes place. According to statistics, by 2028, the revenue opportunities of additive manufacturing (AM) and transparent orthotics will reach $317.3 million. This topic is covered in the report dental additive manufacturing: Opportunity Analysis and ten year forecast in 2019, but the authors believe it may be useful for those considering the use of stealth orthotics in order to better understand the technology behind it and the market for options available on it.

Usually, a patient needs to replace about 30-40 pairs of invisible braces, through the continuous formation of light force on the teeth, to achieve the effect of correction. 30-40 sets of invisible braces means that 30-40 orthodontic tooth models need to be printed, with very small differences between each model. If the traditional processing method is used, it is impossible to customize and mass produce the correction model for patients in a short time. As a kind of digital molding technology, 3D printing can transform any digital design into real object, and 3D printing technology just meets the two conditions of personalization and mass production.

Generally, it can be divided into indirect correction process and direct correction process.

The process of indirect orthodontic treatment is as follows: bite mold impression three-dimensional scanning to obtain data design orthodontic scheme print dental mold (corrected data dental mold) - hot press forming and manufacturing of dental cover.

The process of direct orthodontic treatment is as follows: data acquisition by intraoral scanning - Design of orthodontic scheme - printing of dental pattern (corrected data dental mold) - hot pressing and forming of dental cover.

After the orthodontic treatment plan is determined, the model of each stage of orthodontic treatment is obtained. After the 3D printing of the dental mold, there is a "mold" for making transparent braces.

The reason to obtain the three-dimensional data information of tooth distribution is to design the orthodontic scheme in the software system. The advantage of direct method compared with indirect method is that the data acquisition is more efficient and the accuracy is greatly improved. Doctors put the optical scanning probe of the intraoral scanner into the patient's mouth to directly scan the soft and hard tissues such as teeth and mucosa, and obtain the three-dimensional digital model of patients in real time, which is simple, efficient and accurate.

Sources from: https://creality3dpro.store/blogs/news