WASHINGTON—President Obama earlier this week signed the 21st Century Cures Act, a comprehensive piece of legislation that proponents say will speed up the approval process for new drugs and devices, increase research funding, including the so-called cancer moonshot initiative, and aid research on opioid abuse and such brain diseases as Alzheimer’s, among a number of other initiatives.

On its website, the White House said this bipartisan legislation will go “a long way toward bringing about the medical breakthroughs we need to meet some of the biggest health challenges facing Americans today.”

The Cures Act also includes “key telehealth policy safeguards” that the American Optometric Association (AOA) supported over the past two years while the legislation has been debated on Capitol Hill, according to AOA. “The $6.3 billion legislation was the focus of intense scrutiny by the AOA and others from the start, especially as some parties pushed for sweeping telehealth policy changes, including changes that would have radically altered how eyecare is delivered under the Medicare program,” AOA said in a statement posted on its website.

The association also noted that the “ultimate outcome of the legislation underscores” AOA’s efforts on behalf of its constituents, including optometrists and patients. A key section of the bill, which AOA said it vigorously opposed, would have permitted “a sweeping expansion of telehealth under Medicare.” Instead, the final version of the legislation directs the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to study how telehealth's expansion may or may not work, AOA said.