By: Armbrister S.B. No. 644
A BILL TO BE ENTITLED
AN ACT
1-1 relating to the regulation of certain air ambulance companies.
1-2 BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
1-3 SECTION 1. Section 773.045, Health and Safety Code, is
1-4 amended by amending Subsection (b) and adding Subsections (c) and
1-5 (d) to read as follows:
1-6 (b) A rotor or fixed-wing aircraft and staff based in this
1-7 state and used to transport a patient by stretcher [and that
1-8 advertises as an air ambulance service] is required to be licensed
1-9 by the department.
1-10 (c) An air ambulance company based in another state that
1-11 transports patients from a point in this state is required to be
1-12 licensed by the department as an emergency medical services
1-13 provider. The department shall issue a license to an air ambulance
1-14 company under this subsection if the company applies as required by
1-15 this chapter and has met the department's qualifications for safely
1-16 transporting patients. An air ambulance company accredited by the
1-17 Committee on Air Ambulance Medical Services is rebuttably presumed
1-18 to have met the department's qualifications.
1-19 (d) An air ambulance company licensed under Subsection (c)
1-20 must include information regarding the physical location of the
1-21 company's base operations in any advertising by the company in this
1-22 state.
1-23 SECTION 2. This Act takes effect September 1, 1997.
2-1 SECTION 3. The importance of this legislation and the
2-2 crowded condition of the calendars in both houses create an
2-3 emergency and an imperative public necessity that the
2-4 constitutional rule requiring bills to be read on three several
2-5 days in each house be suspended, and this rule is hereby suspended.