Align

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Inspiration

Many Canadians experience barriers when trying to access dental care. According to the 2025 Insurance Access and Affordability Study conducted by the Canadian digital insurance company PolicyMe in partnership with the Angus Reid Forum, more than half of Canadians (56%) reported delaying health appointments due to cost concerns, with some skipping care altogether [1]. Dental care is among the most commonly postponed services, with the same survey finding that 35% of Canadians specifically skipped or reduced their dental visits [1].

A major factor behind this hesitation is uncertainty around dental insurance. Many patients are not fully aware of what dental insurance they have, what benefits are covered, or how much treatment might cost out of pocket. This lack of clarity can make people reluctant to book appointments, even when they suspect something might be wrong. In fact, reports from Statistics Canada highlight that avoiding oral health professionals is highly prevalent among both uninsured individuals and those who have insurance but cannot afford the out-of-pocket gaps [2].

Accessibility and convenience also play a role. Physical dental clinics are not always located conveniently, and many people may not have the time to schedule and attend an appointment. As a result, minor dental concerns are often ignored until they develop into more serious and costly problems. Clinical data notes that avoiding early check-ups directly contributes to the progression of preventable oral diseases (like tooth decay and gum disease), eventually requiring much more costly and invasive treatments [2].

Providing a quick and accessible way for patients to check whether something might be wrong with their teeth could help lower these barriers. A virtual approach allows users to gain early insights into their oral health without requiring specialized scanning equipment or an immediate in-person visit.

These challenges inspired the idea behind Align, a gamified virtual dental clinic powered by multiple AI agents that guide patients through understanding their oral health journey. By combining photo-based analysis, insurance guidance, habit coaching, and treatment visualization within an interactive environment, Align aims to make dental care more accessible, understandable, and engaging for Canadians before they step into a physical clinic.

And the best part - no dental scanning devices are needed. Everything can be done directly through a phone camera, making early dental insights more accessible for Canadians anytime, anywhere.

What it does

Align is a gamified AI-powered virtual dental clinic that guides patients through their oral health journey.

Users enter an interactive clinic where they control a character and interact with different stations, each powered by a specialized AI agent.

How we built it

We engineered Align as a multi-agent AI system with a gamified frontend experience.

All agents run simultaneously in the background managed by an orchestrator agent, synchronizing with each other to give you the most accurate, and best result.

Interactive Clinic Experience

The frontend simulates a virtual clinic where users can walk around and interact with stations.

Tech stack

React
Next.js
TailwindCSS
TypeScript
Three.js
Gemini
Railtracks
Model Context Protocol
FastAPI
Amazon S3

The game-style interface makes navigating healthcare information more engaging while keeping the workflow intuitive.

Multi-Agent AI System

Each station in the clinic is powered by a specialized AI agent designed to perform a specific task.

Also built with Railtracks to wrap our orchestrating agent.

Agents include:

Vision / Intake Agent

Analyzes uploaded dental images
Identifies visible alignment issues

Financial Agent

Retrieves Sun Life insurance documentation
Uses RAG to recommend optimal insurance plans

Scheduling Agent

Retrieves dentist availability
Suggests appointment options for follow-up consultations

Habit Coaching Agent

Uses Gemini to generate personalized dental hygiene recommendations

Doctor Summary Agent

Orchestrates outputs from all agents
Produces a concise diagnostic report for dentists
Built with Railtracks

Agent Orchestration

We implemented a multi-agent orchestration system in Python that coordinates communication between agents and compiles their outputs into a final structured report.

This orchestration layer ensures that information flows correctly between:

intake analysis
insurance recommendations
treatment visualization
patient habit guidance
provider summaries

RAG Pipeline and Knowledge Retrieval

Our financial and clinical reasoning agents rely on retrieval-based AI pipelines.

We built a vectorized knowledge database that includes:

Sun Life insurance documentation
Dental treatment guidelines
Orthodontic reference material

Using embeddings and semantic retrieval, our agents can query this knowledge base in real time to generate accurate responses without hallucinating information.

Challenges we ran into

Multi-Agent Coordination

Designing a system where multiple AI agents collaborate effectively was one of the biggest challenges. Each agent produces different types of outputs, so we needed a structured orchestration pipeline to combine them into meaningful results.

Healthcare Information Complexity

Dental treatments and insurance policies involve complex terminology. We had to ensure our agents could simplify this information without losing accuracy.

Preventing Hallucinations

Since insurance policies and clinical guidance require accuracy, we built our agents around retrieval-based knowledge systems to ensure responses are grounded in real documentation.

Accomplishments that we're proud of

Building a fully interactive AI-powered virtual clinic
Creating a multi-agent system instead of a single chatbot
Implementing RAG-based insurance reasoning
Generating 3D rendered models of the patients teeth through your phone camera
Turning a traditionally complex healthcare workflow into an engaging experience

Most importantly, we created a system that supports both patients and providers, improving transparency on both sides of the healthcare experience.

What we learned

This project taught us how powerful agentic AI systems can be when designed with specialized roles rather than a single general-purpose model.

We also learned how important it is to design AI tools that support real-world workflows for professionals, not just end users.

Finally, building Align helped us understand how retrieval-based systems can ground AI reasoning in real-world documentation, which is critical for healthcare and insurance applications.

What's next for Align

Our next steps include expanding Align into a fully integrated dental intelligence platform.

Planned improvements include:

More advanced dental image analysis models
Improved orthodontic progression predictions
Integration with real dental providers
A more detailed clinical dashboard for dentists
Deeper integration with insurance providers

Our vision is to make Align a platform where patients can understand their dental future before starting treatment, while dentists receive the insights they need to provide better care.

Ultimately, we want to make dental healthcare more proactive, personalized, and accessible.

References

[1] PolicyMe & Angus Reid Forum (2025). 2025 Insurance Access and Affordability Study. [2] Statistics Canada (2025). Cost-related avoidance of oral health services. Health Canada / Statistics Canada.