Opinion ID: 1689609
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 4

Heading: The Ninety-Day Period

Text: La.Rev.Stat. 40:1299.47 A(2)(a) provides that the filing of a request for a medical review panel shall suspend the time within which suit must be instituted, obviously meaning the one-year prescriptive period under La.Rev.Stat. 9:5628. (emphasis added). Section 1299.47 A(2)(a) further provides that the one-year prescriptive period is suspended until ninety days following notification ... of the issuance of the opinion by the medical review panel. Since a prescriptive period, once suspended, commences to run again upon the termination of the period of suspension under La. Civ.Code art. 3472, Section 1299.47 A(2)(a) in unambiguous language suspends the one-year prescriptive period for medical malpractice actions from the date of filing of the panel request until ninety days after notice of the panel decision, after which the unaccrued portion of the one-year prescriptive period commences to run again under Article 3472. [1] Thus, a medical malpractice victim who files a panel request on the last date of the prescriptive period has ninety days from the notice of the panel decision to file an action in district court, whereas a victim who filed the request earlier in the one-year prescriptive period has ninety days plus the unaccrued portion of the one-year prescriptive period, whatever that portion may be. It is significant that the Legislature used the term suspension, which is a term of art in the Civil Code. If the Legislature had intended for the malpractice victim to have only ninety days from notice of the panel decision, the statute could have provided for filing in the district court within the unaccrued portion of the prescriptive period, but in no event less than ninety days. Or if the Legislature had intended for the victim not to have both ninety days and the unaccrued portion of the prescriptive period, the statute could have provided for ninety days or the unaccrued portion of the period, whichever is longer. The Legislature did neither. Rather, the Legislature expressly provided for suspension of the prescriptive period during the entire time the matter is before the panel until ninety days after the panel decision, and Article 3472 thereafter controls the commencement of the unaccrued portion of the prescriptive period.