Technical term for using regular expressions to classify text?
If the answers are stored correctly with no errors, confusion, or ambiguity then the process is a straight up search and match. If there are typos, misspellings, or what-have-you, the process is a Fuzzy string search. 


  Here's an excellent Medium article delving into the details of a fuzzy string search.


An example where these cases might exceeded is when approved and denied are included in the same transcript. Say 5% of all your cases are such. You'd likely want to apply some machine learning classifier to correctly categorize your input, in which case, your Q might be about the depths of possible solutions.