The secretary of corrections shall employ or contract with a person licensed to practice medicine and surgery to be the chief physician for each correctional institution under the secretary’s supervision and control. One chief physician may be made responsible for more than one such institution. It is hereby made the duty of the chief physician of any correctional institution to direct the operation and management of such institution’s medical services and to supervise and coordinate all inmate health care in such institution. Such physician may recommend to the warden of any institution the transportation of an inmate to an outside medical care facility, as defined by Kan. Stat. Ann. §§ 65-425 and amendments thereto, when necessary to protect the health of such inmate.