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ABBYY AI is the Right Medicine to Extract Data from “Impossible” Pharmacy Receipts

Guest blog post by our partner and ABBYY MVP Mike Stuhley, Formtran

July 8, 2025

To get reimbursed for prescription medicines, people may need to send receipts to their insurance company. What does this look like when these documents are received by the insurance company? What is the quality? Are there multiple receipts taped on a page? Is there a handwritten policy number? For one insurance company, processing these “real world” pharmacy receipts became a migraine headache.

Fortunately, ABBYY has the right software medicine called intelligent document processing (IDP). ABBYY IDP uses the latest AI to automatically extract required fields with a high degree of accuracy. The extracted fields can be fed into a claims' system with little or no manual data entry.

Pre-trained AI models for every document

One part of ABBYY’s magic is that it doesn’t lead with a one-size-fits-all approach to AI. Unlike using a single AI tool like ChatGPT, ABBYY IDP uses dozens of special-purpose AI tools to process every document. AI models for handprint, barcode, and machine print recognition are pre-trained for you to use right away. Depending on which fields need to be extracted, ABBYY even has various AI models to understand text printed from laser printers and dot matrix printers.

For pharmacy receipts, using the right AI tool to extract data from a field lowers the human touch required for processing and increases accuracy.

No mapping required

Another part of ABBYY’s magic is that it doesn’t require a map of where the fields are; it can look at a page and determine where the required fields are based on a few predefined rules. For example, drug names can be stored in a list and ABBYY can find the drug name on the page no matter where it is. This comes in handy when the total number of pharmacy receipts on a page is unknown, or there are multiple drug names on a page.

Automatic validations

ABBYY’s IDP software ensures quality by providing multiple data integrity checks for every field. For example, the IDP software can verify that a drug number only has 11 numeric characters. It can then check an outside database to make sure the drug number is a valid number. If the extracted drug number somehow contained an alpha character or was not in the database, the software would notify an operator that there was a problem that needed review. Using the ABBYY IDP platform to run multiple automatic checks on each field eliminates manual verification time and produces consistent, accurate results.

Speed and accuracy in claims processing are important to both policyholders and insurance companies. Fortunately, ABBYY’s AI-driven IDP makes it possible to automatically process a mountain of pharmacy receipts and get usable data into claims processing systems.

The Formtran + ABBYY advantage

Formtran and ABBYY have been working together since 2003 to automate document processing in healthcare, insurance, and other industries. Together, we help businesses and organizations to save time, cut costs, and ensure accuracy.

Explore ready-to-use AI assets by Formtran on the ABBYY Marketplace.

Mike Stuhley

Mike Stuhley

Mike Stuhley has 30+ years of experience in the document and business process automation industries. He has held executive positions with industry leading vendors including Scantron and Cardiff Software. Stuhley has been a frequent speaker at industry trade shows and is a co-author on a patent for classifying documents. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Finance from San Diego State University.

Connect with Mike on LinkedIn.