While it’s easy to criticize what’s called “congressionally directed spending,” formerly known as earmarks, for having the potential of becoming pork-barrel politics, our trusted elected leaders make good use of the funding formula.

Case in point is the money that U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-West Virginia, has directed to the West Virginia University Health System and WVU’s Health Sciences Center.

More than $23 million in funding will be allocated to projects at WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital, the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute and Chestnut Ridge medical laboratories.

The money will be used to increase space for patients’ treatments, medical research, and administrative areas, renovate labs and purchase new equipment at WVU Hospitals, Inc.

The funding includes:

• $3.5 million for WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital, which will be used to support the design and buildout of the surgical unit.

• $3 million for WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital to purchase needed equipment.

• $2 million for WVU Medicine Children’s Hospital that will be used to improve access to care for stigmatized services.

• $3 million for the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute to be used to support construction of the Interdisciplinary Innovation Space.

• $2.5 million for the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute to be used for administrative buildout.

• $2.5 million for the Chestnut Ridge Cytogenetics Laboratory to be used for renovations for the first cytogenetics lab in the West Virginia.

• $2.434 million for the Chestnut Ridge Cytology Laboratory to be used for renovations for a cellular analysis facility.

• $3.5 million for the Chestnut Ridge Histology Laboratory to be used for renovations for a surgical pathology laboratory.

• $1.16 million for WVU Health Science Center Reducing Visual Impairment to be used to purchase a mass spectrometer and a transmission electron microscope.

With WVU Medicine’s tradition of outstanding patient care and its efforts to expand that care throughout West Virginia, we have no doubt the funding will be put to good use under the direction of WVU Health System President and CEO Albert Wright.

“We are deeply grateful to Sen. Capito for her continued support and advocacy for WVU Medicine and its hospitals, especially, in this instance, our flagship academic medical center in Morgantown, WVU Medicine Children’s, and the WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute,” Wright said.

“We’re especially excited to expand our cytogenetics lab, the only such lab in West Virginia, by building a new, more advanced one in the former Mylan/Viatris plant, which is now home to the WVU Innovation Corporation,” Wright said. “An expanded cytogenetics lab is especially critical as we pursue National Cancer Institute designation for the WVU Cancer Institute.”

It is good to see Capito and other elected officials do their homework in regards to spending federal dollars. Efforts to improve health care, especially here in West Virginia where we have so many medical issues, is money well spent.