Patent ID: 8099305

Claim:
A method of monitoring an orthodontic treatment plan, comprising: receiving a model of at least one tooth of a patient; creating a treatment plan that includes a tooth path segment for the at least one tooth of the patient, the tooth path segment having an initial position and a target position; creating a finite element model of a first candidate dental appliance of a particular type to be positioned on the at least one tooth of the patient to achieve a particular tooth path segment of the treatment plan; computing an effect of the first candidate dental appliance on the at least one tooth using a data mining technique that identifies treatment plans for comparable initial positions and clinical restraints from a database and extracts information including statistically significant treatment outcomes achieved for the identified treatment plans, where the database includes at least one of patient treatment histories, orthodontic therapies, and orthodontic information and diagnostics; outputting in response to determining that the position is sufficiently close to the target position, a data stream including the finite element model for manufacture of the first candidate dental appliance; and creating, in response to determining that the position is not sufficiently close to the target position, a finite element model of a second candidate dental appliance of the particular type to achieve the particular tooth path segment of the treatment plan.