Excessive readmission rates have resulted in penalties for about 30 Western Pennsylvania hospitals who will now receive reduced reimbursement payments from Medicare for the coming year.

UPMC St. Margaret was hit with the biggest penalty among the region’s general acute care hospitals at 1.28 percent, while Alle-Kiski Medical Center — now Allegheny Valley Hospital — in Natrona Heights was penalized 1.01 percent.

According to the nonprofit Kaiser Health News, the average penalty nationally was 0.63 percent, up from 0.38 percent a year ago.

This is the third year that the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, or CMS, has levied penalties for what it considers higher-than-expected hospital readmission rates.

The program is meant to encourage hospitals to pay more attention to taking necessary steps, such as better discharge plans and post-discharge monitoring, to reduce the number of patients returning to the hospital within one month after they are discharged.

Grove City Medical Center in Mercer County has avoided a penalty for all three years. Others avoiding a readmission penalty for the next year are Ohio Valley General Hospital in Kennedy and UPMC Bedford in Bedford County.

Jane Montgomery, vice president for clinical services and quality for the Hospital Council of Western Pennsylvania, said the CMS considered three additional diagnoses this year: total hip replacements, total knee replacements and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder, or COPD.

“COPD is hard,” she said. “Because it’s chronic, it’s something that doesn’t go away. It’s something that needs to be managed.” She noted that, despite that added challenge, 18 Western Pennsylvania hospitals saw their penalties decreased in this round.

Kaiser Health News reported that, nationally, three-fourths of hospitals under the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program face fines this year. An online chart of impacted hospitals can be found on the Kaiser Health News website: http://​capsules.kaiserhealthnews.org/​wp-content/​uploads/​2014/​10/​Readmissions-Year-3.pdf.

The fines, based on reported readmissions from July 2010 through June 2013, will be assessed though lower Medicare reimbursement payments through September 2015.