BCBS Parser

The Blue Cross-Blue Shield (BCBS) websites for various states in the U.S. provide PDF documents for reimbursement rates

ex - https://www.bcbstx.com/provider/standards/standards-requirements/gri

BCBS doesn't provide this information in any other format than a PDF, which is quite difficult to incorporate into MS Excel or other data manipulation tooling.

This Python module provides scripts that can parse the files and generate TSV files

Requirements

python 3.7+

Installation

Create a python virtual environment and install the requirements via pip.

macOS / *nix

python3 -m venv venv/
source venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

Windows

python3 -m venv venv/
.\venv\Scripts\activate.bat
pip install -r requirements.txt

Usage

Execute python scripts via python {script_name.py} or use the included launch.json file to execute in VS Code.

• ndc.py -- "NDC" code sheet parser

  This reads files like ndc-example.pdf and outputs a TSV file of the table contents from each page in the file. The file's "header row" in the table is not included in the TSV file output.

  1. Edit the script's input & output file where the comments denote with # !!

  2. When you execute the script, the terminal will first prompt you for the date. This should correspond to the date value in the "End Date" column of the NDC PDF file. The second prompt is to ensure you typed it correctly; enter 'y' to continue or 'n' to abort (will also abort on anything not 'y'). NOTE - the program matches the text exactly, so be sure the numbers and slash separators are correct.

  $ Month-ending date pattern in the file, i.e. 5/31/24:  11/30/24
  $ Using date pattern 11/30/24. OK?  (y/n):  y
  

  3. When the script finishes, the output will dump to the terminal as well as the TSV file to indicate completion

• no_ndc.py -- "No NDC" code sheet parser This reads files like no-ndc-example.pdf and outputs a TSV file of the table contents from each page in the file.

  1. Edit the script's input & output file where the comments denote with # !!

  2. Unlike the previous script, no input is required for execution. The script will dump the output to the terminal and the TSV file to indicate completion.

Why TSV?

Using comma-separated value files (CSV) proves difficult to work with because of commas included in the dollar amount fields. Using tab-separated value files (TSV) bypasses this, and TSV are easily interoperable in Excel

Maintenance?

This script is 100% dependent on the exact text-matching of the paragraphs of text in the PDF files provided by Blue Cross/Blue Shield. See the header_value and footer_value variables in each python file for the exact text-matching being used to distinguish the table data. Should the text provided by BC/BS change, these values will need to be updated!