The 2026 ANZ Clinical Aligner Workflow Stack

Clear aligner programmes are now a baseline offering at most Australian orthodontic practices. The hard part isn't selling them — it's running the workflow at scale without burning chairtime or compromising case outcomes. This guide walks through the eight-stage workflow most ANZ practices have settled on for 2026, and the consumables that actually do the work at each stage.

Why workflow matters more than brand

You probably hear it in your own waiting room. “We chose Invisalign because…” or “Our friend went with Spark…” Patients pick aligner systems by brand, but every modern PETG-based aligner — Invisalign, Spark, Angel Aligner, ClearCorrect, and the in-house programmes a growing number of ANZ practices now run — works on essentially the same biomechanics. What separates a profitable, predictable aligner practice from a chaotic one isn't the system. It's the workflow stack: the same set of accessories, materials and instruments deployed consistently, case after case.

Below is the eight-stage workflow we see most often in Australian and New Zealand orthodontic and high-volume dental practices. Whether you treat 50 aligner cases a year or 500, this is the shape of it.

Stage 1 — Case planning and pre-treatment IPR

The first physical accessory hits the patient at the IPR step. Whether your ClinCheck, Spark Approver or Angel Aligner setup calls for staged interproximal reduction, the practical choice is between hand strips and contra-angle discs:

• Diamond-coated IPR strips for single-tooth precision and tight contacts.
• Contra-angle flexible IPR discs for multi-tooth and posterior IPR — faster, less hand fatigue.
• Interproximal stripper kits for cases with significant reduction across multiple contacts.

Our IPR collection stocks all three formats. Most practices we work with keep a starter assortment plus a single-grit bulk pack of their preferred strip in the bonding tray. The Airo single-sided strips remain the most-ordered SKU because they minimise the risk of over-reducing the contact.

Stage 2 — Attachment bonding

Attachments are where aligner mechanics happen. Without them, you're moving teeth with passive pressure; with them, you can deliver rotation, intrusion, extrusion, and torque. The bonding workflow:

1. Pumice, etch, rinse, dry.
2. Apply a bonding resin — the Reliance Assure Plus bonds wet or dry enamel and skips a primer step.
3. Seat the attachment template from the case.
4. Inject a flowable composite — Reliance Flow Tain LV is the standard. The thixotropic properties prevent slumping inside the template, which is the difference between a sharp attachment and a blurred one.
5. Cure, remove template, finish.

For practices building auxiliary mechanics on top of attachments — for instance buttons for elastic-driven rotation — keep both metal bondable buttons and aesthetic rectangular clear ceramic buttons on the tray. The metal version bonds faster; the ceramic version is what patients see in selfies.

Stage 3 — Initial aligner delivery and seating

Two consumables matter at first delivery:

• Aligner chewies. Practices that issue chewies at delivery see better aligner seating and fewer “they don't fit” calls in week two. Latex-free chewies in patient-issue bulk packs are now the default — flavoured options exist if your demographic skews adolescent.
• Aligner removal tools. Sending patients home with a plastic removal hook from day one drops attachment failures during early tray changes. Stock these in practice-pack quantities.

Hand both out at the delivery appointment, ideally inside a branded retainer case the patient will actually carry.

Stage 4 — Mid-treatment auxiliaries and refinement

Around tray 8–15 you start needing auxiliary mechanics — Class II elastics, midline correction elastics, single-tooth extrusion elastics. The full mid-treatment kit:

• Reliance Relastics intra-oral latex elastics in clinical force gradients. 50-packs of 100 last most practices a quarter.
• Bondable buttons (covered above) for elastic anchorage to teeth that didn't get an attachment.
• Crimpable hooks if you need surgical or anchorage assistance — see the Attachments & Auxiliaries collection.

Stage 5 — Aesthetic management during treatment

The “I look weird with the gap showing” complaint is real, particularly in adult cases with diastemas, missing laterals or rotated teeth that show black triangles mid-treatment. Two consumables solve it:

• Pontic paint — Perfect-A-Smile from Reliance is a single-component light-cure paste available in 10 shades (A1 through D3 plus Bleach, Light and Medium). It bonds to any aligner material and won't crack with distortion. Four-gram jars; a single jar covers 15–20 cases.
• Bite turbos if you need posterior occlusal opening — the pink T.K.O. Bite Turbo Gel is the most ordered in this category.

Stage 6 — Aligner adjustment

When a single aligner isn't seating, you have three options: skip the tray (rarely correct), refine (slow), or chairside adjust. Practice-grade aligner pliers let you put precision indentations in the aligner without heat distortion. The Ixion range covers the three movements that matter:

• Ixion Rotation plier — 1.5 mm × 0.75 mm vertical indentation for single-tooth rotation.
• Ixion Retention plier — 1 mm circular indentation for retention gain on a retainer or stubborn aligner.
• Ixion Torque plier — horizontal indentation for individual root torque.

Most practices buy the three-plier set once and keep them on the aligner tray. ANZ trade pricing applies on the set.

Stage 7 — Retention transition

The end of aligner treatment isn't the end of retention. The transition workflow:

1. Final aligner doubled as a passive retainer for 2 weeks.
2. Bonded lingual retainer placed on upper and/or lower incisors using Flow Tain LV and Ortho Flex-Tech stainless steel wire.
3. Clear thermoformed retainer fabricated from Iconic 1 mm material for night-time wear.

The thermoformed retainer is where many practices unnecessarily wait 2 weeks for lab fabrication. Running in-house aligner programmes means you already have the thermoforming machine and the PETG sheets — fabricate the retainer chairside and hand it over before the patient leaves.

Stage 8 — Patient take-home and ongoing maintenance

The patient leaves with three things in a labelled case:

• Retainer (clear) plus retainer case — ventilated, hinged, practice-branded if you've gone that route. See practice-pack cases.
• Cleaning product. The EverSmile AlignerFresh spray is the in-mouth cleaning option; EverSmile AllClean cleaning minerals are the soak option. Stock both — adolescent patients reach for the spray, adults for the soak.
• Reorder pathway. The single biggest miss we see is no clear way for the patient to reorder cases, cleaning product or replacement chewies. If you're not already, set up your front desk to take phone reorders or include a reorder QR on the case label.

Stocking the workflow stack

The full eight-stage stack on a single quarterly purchase order, sized for a 200-case-a-year practice:

• 1× starter IPR kit + 4× bulk Airo strips (annual)
• 1× Assure Plus + 5× Flow Tain LV syringes per quarter
• 2× metal button packs + 1× clear ceramic button pack per quarter
• 4× chewie packs (10 pairs each) per quarter
• 2× aligner removal tool packs per quarter
• 1× Relastics 50-pack per quarter
• 1× Perfect-A-Smile pontic paint per quarter (rotating shade)
• 1× Ixion three-plier set (once — replace every 3+ years)
• 1× Iconic 1 mm thermoforming pack per quarter
• 2× retainer case packs + cleaning product per quarter

Everything in this list is in the Aligner Workflow collection. Order before 2:30 pm AEST and it ships same-day from our Brisbane warehouse. ANZ trade pricing applies on practices running 10+ aligner accessory packs per month — talk to your account manager.

Next in this series: the bonding protocol behind a low-failure-rate clear aligner programme. For archwire-based cases (still ~60% of fixed-appliance treatment in ANZ), see our archwires range and the NiTi decision guide.