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CBCT 3D imaging IT for dental clinics
CBCT 3D imaging and your IT
A CBCT takes 3D x-rays. Its images live apart from your everyday practice software, and a bridge links them to the right patient.
What is a CBCT?
A CBCT (cone beam CT) is a bigger device that takes 3D dental x-rays. The Vatech machines and the Dentsply Sirona Axeos are two examples. Each comes with its own 3D software, such as Ez3D-i from Vatech and Sidexis 4 with the Axeos.
Practice software
Holds the patient and their unique ID.
The bridge
Links the patient ID to the matching one in the 3D software.
3D CBCT software
Renders and keeps the 3D images, on a local home.
How the bridge works
Standard 2D imaging software can’t handle 3D rendering, so 3D images are usually kept in a separate database in the 3D software. The patient’s unique ID in your practice software links to the matching identifier in the 3D software. Vatech’s own guidance says details such as chart ID, name, date of birth and gender need to be filled in, or the link can fail. The bridge comes from your software vendors. We look after the IT underneath it.
What IT gets right
- Gigabit, wired. 1GbE is the standard baseline. Dentsply Sirona’s site survey asks for gigabit across its 3D imaging network and doesn’t support wireless. Fun tip: 10GbE helps big images load smoothly.
- Storage with headroom. 3D images are large and the library keeps growing. We plan generous space on RAID 10 storage, our recommendation, or RAID 6 when you need more usable space for the money.
- Hyper-V and tested backups. The server runs on Hyper-V. CBCT images sit inside the 3-2-1 backups, with restores tested.
- A local home. CBCT images aren’t supported in the cloud, even with cloud practice software. They need a local home and a bridge. For the vendors we work with, including Vatech, Sirona, Dexis, KaVo, Carestream and Newtom, imaging doesn’t run in the cloud product and uses a bridge to a local home.
- Planned changes. An update to either program gets a plan, a tested backup, a short lived checkpoint just before the change and a retest of the bridge.
- Recovery. A 3D image library is large, so a restore can take longer. We ask how long you could be without it, so you know the answer. See what happens when something fails.
Product names belong to their owners. We’re independent IT support, not affiliated with the vendors named here.
Why it matters, in plain words
The tech behind this page, and why it’s there. See all the plain guides.
RAID 10
Why two healthy drives still aren’t a backup
RAID 10 keeps the server running when a drive dies. It also copies a mistake or ransomware to every drive instantly.
Hyper-V
Why one dead server shouldn’t stop the clinic
On Hyper-V, the server is a set of files that can come back on other hardware. Restores from local storage have taken less than 2 hours.
Immutable backups
Why ransomware goes after the clinic’s backups first
Without backups, the clinic has to pay or rebuild. Our copies are locked for 30 days, and no one, not even us, can delete them early.
CBCT questions
Can CBCT images live in cloud practice software?
No. CBCT images aren’t supported in the cloud, so they need a local home with backups and a bridge. Cloud practice software can still be bridged to the local 3D software.
What happens to the bridge when we upgrade?
It’s part of the plan. We take a tested backup, add a short lived checkpoint, make the change, then retest that the right patient opens in both programs.