(a) Each person licensed to practice optometry under the provisions of this chapter who provides direct patient care services shall maintain professional liability insurance or other indemnity against liability for professional malpractice. The amount of insurance that each such person shall carry as insurance or indemnity against claims for injury or death for professional malpractice shall not be less than five hundred thousand dollars for one person, per occurrence, with an aggregate of not less than one million five hundred thousand dollars.

(b) Each insurance company that issues professional liability insurance, as defined in subdivisions (1), (6), (7), (8) and (9) of subsection (b) of § 38a-393, shall, on and after January 1, 1997, render to the Commissioner of Public Health a true record of the names, according to classification, of cancellations of and refusals to renew professional liability insurance policies and the reasons for such cancellations or refusal to renew said policies for the year ending on the thirty-first day of December next preceding.