Normalize a drug name (RxNorm)
Exactbiotech_drug_lookupDeterministic and authoritative — the canonical answer for this input.
Normalize a drug brand, generic, or ingredient name (or an RxCUI) to its canonical RxNorm concept. Returns RxCUI, canonical name, term type, and dose forms. confidence 1.0 = exact name (or direct RxCUI); 0.8 = single approximate match; 0.5 = multiple approximate candidates (lowest RxCUI returned); 0.0 = no match. RxNorm passthrough (cached); an outage or throttle gives a retryable error. For all known names use biotech_drug_synonyms; batch via biotech_drug_lookup_batch. Charges 2 cost_units; 1 when the query is empty (rejected locally before RxNorm is called); an unknown query_type is a request-shape error, rejected unbilled (INVALID_INPUT).
Parameters
querystringrequiredThe drug name or RxCUI to look up (e.g. 'Tylenol').
query_typestringoptionalHow to interpret the query: 'name' (default; a drug brand, generic, or ingredient name, approximate-matched) or 'rxcui' (an RxNorm concept id).
Call it
curl -X POST https://api.snipget.ai/v1/biotech/drug/lookup \
-H "Authorization: Bearer sk_live_..." \
-H "Content-Type: application/json" \
-d '{"query":"Tylenol"}'The Batch tab sends up to 1000 inputs in one call via /v1/biotech/drug/lookup/batch.
FAQ
Why use this?
It collapses any brand, generic, or ingredient name to one canonical RxNorm concept (its RxCUI, preferred name, term type, and dose forms), so 'Tylenol' and 'acetaminophen' resolve to the same thing. That's the reliable way to join messy drug data instead of guessing.
How sure is the match?
Confidence 1.0 is an exact name match, 0.8 is a single approximate match, and 0.5 means several candidates matched and the lowest RxCUI was returned. matchType is exact in that the answer is RxNorm's authoritative concept, but read the confidence on approximate matches before trusting them.
What does it not do?
It normalizes the name. It does not return dosing guidance, interactions, or every alternate name. For the full list of brand and generic names use drug synonyms.
What if the drug isn't found or the service is down?
An unknown drug returns confidence 0, not an error. A brief RxNorm outage returns a 503 so you can retry.