Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015, or MACRA, has got the signature of President Barack Obama to make it a law. The bill was passed by the House of Representatives on March 26 and by the Senate on April 14. It has paved the way for permanently taking out of the equation the long-maligned Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR) formula for Medicare physician payment.

Receiving the signature of Obama on the act means a new law through the largest healthcare bill since the Affordable Care Act was passed five years ago. It will now serve the purpose of improving the way reimbursement takes place for Medicare doctors in addition to filling a funding gap and extending a popular children’s insurance program.

A rare moment of bipartisanship in Congress was marked by the $214 billion bill known as the Medicare Access and CHIP Reauthorization Act of 2015. It’s not often when Democrats and Republicans together send a bill to the president’s desk.

Obama wanted for long to revise a flawed and obsolete 1997 law for paying doctors who treat Medicare patients. The previous law had intention of cutting reimbursements, but it ultimately led to large enough reductions that many physicians threatened to leave the program.

CDC has said that Obamacare drops number of uninsured to lowest level in 15 years. “It encourages us to continue to make the health care system smarter without denying service. As a consequence, it's going to be good for people who use Medicare. It's going to be good for our seniors. Ultimately it's going to be good for all of us”, said Obama.

Obama said the new law will make it possible to pay doctors as per quality of care being given by them. It is for benefit of people as doctors would need to provide them good care to draw good payments.