1.    The department of health and human services shall license emergency medical services operations and may designate their service areas. The department shall limit the issuance of a license for any new emergency medical services operation based on the needs of the service area. A license for an emergency medical services operation is nontransferable.

2.    Emergency medical services may not be advertised, offered, or provided to the public except by an emergency medical services operator that provides the emergency medical services through emergency medical services personnel.

3.    Except as otherwise provided under subsection 4, an emergency medical services operator must be separately licensed for each of the operator’s emergency medical services operations and an operation that is headquartered from a separate location must be considered a separate operation. Under this subsection, an operation with a single headquarters site may dispatch vehicles and emergency medical services personnel from more than one location if calls requesting services are received and orders for vehicle dispatch are made at the single headquarters site.

4.    Notwithstanding subsection 3, an operator of an emergency medical services operation may operate one or more substation ambulance services operations under a single license if:

a.    The headquarters ambulance services operation is not a substation ambulance services operation of another emergency medical services operation; b.    The substation ambulance services operation area borders the headquarters ambulance services operation area or borders another substation of the headquarters ambulance services operation; c.    The headquarters ambulance services operation and the substation ambulance services operation are dispatched by the same entity; and

d.    The operator of the emergency medical services operation pays a license fee for each of its substation ambulance services operations.

5.    The provisions of this chapter do not apply to an operator from another state which is headquartered at a location outside of this state and transports patients across state lines, but the operator may not treat patients within this state or pick up patients within this state for transportation to locations within this state, except as provided by rule.

6.    The department of health and human services shall adopt rules for special licenses and waiver provisions for an operator of an emergency medical services operation intended for industrial sites not available to the general public.