Hospitals in California with the smallest Medicare readmissions penalties

About these rankings

Rankings use the 2026 release of CMS Care Compare data. Hospitals share a rank (“T”) when their values are equal, and only hospitals with a reported value for the sorted measure are ranked. Shading compares each value with every hospital in the country, so it doesn’t change with your filters. Small differences are often not statistically meaningful; use the methodology and glossary for context.

Readmissions penalty

Change to Medicare payments under the Hospital Readmissions Reduction Program, which cuts payments (by up to 3%) to hospitals with more readmissions than expected. 0% means no penalty..

Overall star rating

CMS overall hospital quality star rating (1-5).

Patient survey star rating

HCAHPS summary star rating (1-5).

Heart attack death rate

30-day death rate for heart attack patients.

Heart failure death rate

30-day death rate for heart failure patients.

Hospital-wide readmission rate

Rate of unplanned readmission within 30 days, all conditions. From 2025 CMS reports the Hybrid Hospital-Wide Readmission measure (claims plus EHR data), which replaced the claims-only measure; values are close but not strictly comparable across the change. CMS suppressed it for 2026.. Latest available: 2025 release.

Serious complications

Patient safety and adverse events composite (PSI 90; 1.0 = national value).

Time in emergency department

Median time patients spent in the emergency department before leaving.

Medicare spending per patient

Medicare spending per beneficiary episode relative to the national median (1.0 = national median).

Total beds

Total beds reported to CMS (Provider of Services file).