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Submit a non-AlignerBot case to a dental lab

For cases designed by people at a partner lab, this guide covers the new-case form in Cympha dental lab case management software, from choosing the service to payment.

Audience: Clinicians (dentists, orthodontists, prosthodontists, surgeons) sending an Ortho, Implant, or any custom lab-service case to a partner lab — anything that is not an AlignerBot AI case. If you're submitting AlignerBot specifically, see submit-alignerbot-case instead.

You'll come away knowing: how to fill the new-case form for a manually-designed case, the differences from the AlignerBot intake (free-text is allowed, no XML requirement), how to search for your lab, how to pick a service, how pricing and consent work, and what status the case lands in after you submit.

Time required: Around ten minutes the first time. Three to five minutes per case after that — most of which is uploading scans.

Before you start

You need:

  • A Cympha account with the Clinical role. If you signed up as a designer or lab manager, the New Case button won't appear on your dashboard. See role-matrix if you're unsure which role you have.
  • A partner lab already on Cympha. Either you know the lab manager's email (so you can search them up) or you plan to use GuideMia's first-party design lab as a fallback.
  • The files the case needs. For ortho: per-arch STL or PLY scans. For implant: a CBCT zip plus optical scans. For a custom lab service: whatever the lab asks for — see Step 4.
  • The patient's name. Gender, date of birth, and chief complaints are optional but useful — they appear on the lab slip and the designer's planning notes.

If you don't yet have all the files, you can still open the form. A draft case is reserved the moment the page loads, and your in-progress work is preserved while you upload. The case doesn't reach the lab until you press Submit Case.

Step 1 — Open the new-case page

Sign into app.cympha.com and click + New Case on the dashboard (top right), or go directly to app.cympha.com/cases/new. The page header reads New Case.

Difference from AlignerBot: the form is the same form. The category selection later in the flow is what makes the difference — for non-AlignerBot work you'll either pick Ortho / Implant on the GuideMia tile, or pick a custom lab service from your own lab's services list.

Step 2 — Pick the lab

The first section is titled LAB. You have two paths:

  • GuideMia Design Lab — the first-party AI design service. Click this card only if you want to send the case to GuideMia (Ortho or Implant work is human-designed; AlignerBot is bot-designed). The description reads "First-party AI design — orthodontic planning, clear aligner design, and implant guides."
  • Your own lab — use the search box labelled Have your own lab? Find it by lab name, or your lab manager's name or email. Type the manager's exact Cympha email (the one they sign in with) and pick from the dropdown. There is no public directory; you have to know the lab manager.

If you can't find your lab, ask the lab manager to confirm the email they used to register on Cympha. A typo (gmail vs googlemail, a trailing period) is the usual culprit.

Step 3 — Pick the service

What appears here depends on what you picked in Step 2.

If you chose GuideMia Design Lab: three category tiles appear — Ortho, AlignerBot, Implant. For a non-AlignerBot case, click Ortho (orthodontic plan with brackets, retainers, or manual aligner design) or Implant (surgical guide).

If you chose your own lab: a Service row appears with one button per service the lab has set up. Service names mirror what the lab put in their profile — examples: Clear Aligners, Crown & Bridge, Implant Prosthetics, Night Guard, Surgical Guide, Custom Impression Trays. A tile may show a price the lab has published for that service.

Pick exactly one service. The form below will reshape itself based on what that service expects.

Step 4 — Let the AI fill the form (optional)

Under the AI Extraction section there's a paste box. If you already have a clinical paragraph in your notes ("58-year-old female, missing lower 36 and 37, considering Straumann BLT implants, drilling sleeves available, prefer GuideMia universal kit ..."), paste it and click the extract button.

  • For Ortho or Implant under GuideMia, the parser fills in the structured form fields below.
  • For a custom lab service with a template, the parser fills the lab's own template fields where it can map them. If the lab uploaded an order-form PDF, the extractor uses that template; if not, you'll see "This service has no template — fill the general instructions below."

Review every field after extraction. The parser is good for the obvious stuff but does not catch every nuance, and the lab's designer will read what you submit verbatim.

Difference from AlignerBot: for a custom lab service you can also just type free-text instructions in the Treatment Parameters section. There is no XML or GPK requirement. The lab's human designer will read your prose. AlignerBot is the only category that requires structured tooth-position artifacts because the bot can only act on machine-readable input.

Step 5 — Upload the files

Scroll to the Files section. You can drop files into the dropzone, paste from clipboard, or click Upload via Agent if you have the Cympha Agent Manager paired (desktop only, see install-pair-agent-manager).

What to upload depends on the service. Once you pick a service, a Suggested files checklist appears below the dropzone. Each row turns green as a matching file is recognised. Common expectations:

  • Ortho case — upper STL, lower STL, bite scan, intra-oral photos, ideally a panoramic X-ray or CBCT for diagnosis.
  • Implant case — a CBCT zip (the full DICOM series, zipped — most CBCT machines export this directly), upper and lower STL, ideally a planned restoration scan or wax-up. See file-formats-reference for the exact format expectations.
  • Crown & bridge, dentures, guards, splints, custom appliances — whatever the lab listed in their suggested files. Typically the optical scan and bite, plus any photos or prescriptions.
  • Prescription / order form — drop the original PDF or a photo of your handwritten prescription. The lab keeps it on file.

Files keep uploading in the background while you continue filling the form. You don't have to wait for the upload bar to finish before pressing Submit Case.

Step 6 — Fill patient info and treatment parameters

The Patient Information block asks for name (required), gender, date of birth, and chief complaints.

For GuideMia Ortho / Implant, the Treatment Parameters block is the structured form you'd see in the lab slip — arch ranges, occlusal classes, implant brand, surgical kit, drilling sleeves, etc. For Implant you also pick the deliverable tier (preliminary plan, GuideMia report, full project) via the checkboxes near the bottom of the block.

For a custom lab service, two shapes are possible:

  • The lab has an order form template — you see a structured form with the lab's fields (because the lab uploaded their PDF and extracted the fields, see customise-your-lab-intake-form). Fill the fields as you would the lab's paper form.
  • The lab has no template — you see a General Instructions textarea. Type what you'd normally write on a paper requisition: shade, material, contact preferences, occlusion notes, anything else.

Optional Expected Date — when you want it back. The lab sees this as a soft target.

Step 7 — Pricing and consent

If the service shows a published price, a pricing-consent checkbox appears so you acknowledge it before submitting.

The binding price, though, is settled on the case itself: the lab manager reviews your submission and sends a price, and the case's Pricing panel shows Proposed price: with Accept and Reject buttons. Nothing is charged until you accept. If the lab has opted into payment through Cympha, a pay button appears once you've accepted the price and you complete a secure checkout; labs that don't take platform payments arrange payment their own way — ask in the case chat.

A Privacy & GDPR checkbox always appears: "I confirm I have the patient's consent to upload their data to Cympha and share it with the selected lab." All consent checkboxes shown must be ticked before the submit button enables.

Step 8 — Submit

Click Submit Case at the bottom of the form. If uploads are still in flight, the button shows a small spinner while it waits — you'll see Uploading files... until everything has finished and the case is promoted.

You'll be navigated to the new case detail page at /cases/<id>. The status reads Submitted.

What happens next

  • Status flips out of Submitted when the lab triages. Every submitted case starts at Submitted, held by the lab manager. If the lab has a Case Intaker on the team, status moves to Intake Review and the intaker checks files first; if not, it goes straight to Designing when a designer is assigned. See case-status-glossary for what each status means.
  • The case appears on your dashboard at / with the new status. You can chat with the lab via the Message button on the row, or open the case to see the activity log.
  • When a design is ready for you, status flips to Awaiting Approval and you get an email. Open the case and click Review and Approve to reach /cases/<id>/approve. How many times you'll do this depends on the category: GuideMia's Ortho and Implant categories have two approval cycles — first the Treatment Plan, then the Appliance Design — while a custom lab service has a single Design approval (the button reads Approve Design). See approve-or-reject-a-design for what the Approve, Request changes, and Escalate to lab manager buttons do.

Troubleshooting

I can't find the lab. The search matches the lab name, the lab manager's name, and the lab manager's email. Ask the lab manager to confirm the email shown under their /profile page. There is no public directory.

The "Submit Case" button is disabled. Three common reasons: (1) patient name is empty, (2) you haven't picked a service, (3) you haven't ticked the pricing or privacy consent checkbox. Scroll up and look for the red asterisks.

The suggested-files checklist doesn't recognise my upload. Matching is deliberately cautious — when Cympha can't confidently place a file in a slot, it leaves the row unticked rather than guessing. The lab still receives the file either way. A descriptive filename (e.g. upper_arch.stl instead of IMG_4567.jpg — any language works) helps the match.

I uploaded the wrong file. Click the trash icon at the end of the file row to delete it, then re-upload the right one. Uploads and deletes are blocked only once a case is delivered (digital) or cancelled — so you can still fix a wrong file after submitting. If the lab is already designing, mention the swap in the case chat so they pick up the right file.

My case is stuck in Submitted for days. Open the case and use the chat to ping the lab manager. For Submitted specifically, the lab manager already holds the case, so a direct chat message is the effective route.

Related how-tos: submit-alignerbot-case for the AlignerBot AI variant, file-formats-reference for what each upload should look like, case-status-glossary, approve-or-reject-a-design, manage-your-cases.

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