If you were hurt in Louisiana by someone else's conduct, you generally have one year from the date of the injury to file a personal-injury lawsuit. The deadline comes from Louisiana Civil Code article 3492, and the clock starts on the date the harm occurred. Miss the window and the courthouse door closes, even if the underlying case is strong.
The one-year number is the rule most Louisiana injury searches return, and it is among the shortest in the United States. Louisiana is also unique in that it uses civil-law terminology inherited from the French and Spanish codes: the deadline is called a prescription, not a statute of limitations, and the running of prescription is governed by Civil Code rules rather than common-law tolling doctrines. This post walks through what the one-year prescription really means in 2026, where the exceptions are, and the fact patterns we see trip people up most.
The default Louisiana PI window: one year under LA C.C. art. 3492
LA C.C. art. 3492 provides that delictual actions are subject to a liberative prescription of one year. The article is the catch-all for the vast majority of Louisiana PI cases: car crashes, slip-and-falls, dog bites, premises liability, and most negligence claims.
The clock starts on the date the injury occurred or, in narrow categories, the date the injury was or should have been discovered (contra non valentem, the civil-law equivalent of the discovery rule).
Louisiana is a fault-based auto-insurance state. The injured party's recovery generally runs through the at-fault driver's insurer or your own uninsured-motorist coverage.
Exception one: the one-year prescription trap
The single most common Louisiana PI trap is the one-year window itself. Claimants used to two-year or three-year windows in neighboring states miss the prescription almost routinely. The clock starts on the date of the accident, not the date the medical bills come in, not the date the insurance dispute hardens, not the date counsel is retained.
Louisiana does recognize interruption of prescription. Under LA C.C. art. 3462, filing suit or formally acknowledging a debt interrupts prescription. A demand letter alone does not interrupt prescription; suit must be filed. A few categories such as solidary obligor relationships (LA C.C. art. 3503) can complicate the analysis, and tactical interruption is sometimes available, but the default is: file within one year or lose the claim.
Exception two: government claims under the Louisiana Governmental Claims Act
Claims against the State of Louisiana, its agencies, and political subdivisions are governed by LA R.S. 13:5106 et seq. The general one-year prescription still applies, but procedural rules differ: claims against the State must be brought in specific venues, certain damages categories are capped (the general damages cap on State liability is $500,000 per person under LA R.S. 13:5106(B)), and there are no jury trials against the State or its political subdivisions under LA R.S. 13:5105.
Local government tort claims have their own notice rules that vary by parish ordinance; consult counsel before assuming standard prescription applies.
Exception three: medical malpractice
Medical-malpractice claims are governed by the Louisiana Medical Malpractice Act, LA R.S. 40:1231.1 et seq. The prescription is one year from the date of the alleged act or omission, OR one year from the date of discovery, but in no event more than three years from the act (a statute of repose). Claims must first be submitted to a Medical Review Panel under LA R.S. 40:1231.8 before suit can be filed; the request to the panel suspends prescription.
Exception four: minors
Prescription against minors generally does not run during minority for most personal actions under LA C.C. art. 3469 and related provisions. Government-claim rules and the medmal three-year repose can still apply.
What Louisiana's pure comparative fault rule means in practice
Louisiana applies pure comparative fault under LA C.C. art. 2323. A plaintiff who is 90% at fault recovers 10% of damages. There is no 50% or 51% bar. This is more plaintiff-friendly than most states; juries can apportion fault freely.
The 2024 amendments to LA C.C. art. 2323 by Act 19 narrowed some employer immunity questions but preserved the pure comparative regime for the standard PI case.
A common Louisiana fact pattern that ends cases early
A motorist is hit by a delivery truck on I-10. The motorist is treated, released, and assumes the trucking company's insurer will resolve the claim. Negotiations drag through month 11. The insurer's last-minute offer is rejected. Counsel is retained at month 13. Prescription ran at month 12. The case is over.
The takeaway: in Louisiana, do not wait for the insurance negotiation to mature. File or formally interrupt prescription well inside the one-year window. The civil-law system does not forgive late filings the way some common-law equivalents (with tolling doctrines) sometimes do.
Other Louisiana-specific PI rules worth knowing
Dog bites. Louisiana applies a strict-liability rule under LA C.C. art. 2321 when the owner could have prevented the injury and did not. One-year prescription.
Wrongful death. Wrongful-death and survival actions have a one-year prescription under LA C.C. arts. 2315.1 and 2315.2. Standing follows the civil-code hierarchy (spouse and children first, then parents, then siblings).
Premises liability and slip-and-fall. One-year prescription. LA R.S. 9:2800.6 governs merchant liability for slip-and-fall cases and requires the plaintiff to prove the merchant created or had actual or constructive notice of the hazardous condition.
How the LawSensai Personal Injury Recovery Center helps with Louisiana matters
We built the Recovery Center to handle the day-one organizational work in a Louisiana PI case so that nothing falls through the cracks during the one-year prescription. We document the incident through a calm, save-and-resume intake, build a medical-and-evidence timeline, and surface every applicable deadline, including the State $500,000 cap, the medmal one-year prescription with three-year repose, the Medical Review Panel requirement, and the underlying LA C.C. art. 3492 one-year window. When the matter is well-documented and ready, we route it to a verified personal-injury attorney licensed in Louisiana. Start your Louisiana intake here.
We are not a law firm and we do not give legal advice. We are the file-organization and deadline-surfacing layer that sits in front of a real attorney.
Personal injury statute of limitations in other states
Each state has its own SOL window, government-notice deadline, comparative-fault regime, and case-type quirks. The deep-dive posts here cover the highest-volume jurisdictions. The full LawSensai PI Recovery Center routes 50-state coverage at /personal-injury.
- Georgia (2-year SOL, ante-litem traps)
- Texas (CPRC 16.003, 51% bar)
- Florida (HB 837 2-year SOL)
- Tennessee (1-year SOL)
- Mississippi (3-year SOL, MTCA 90-day notice)
Informational only
LawSensai is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice. The information in this post is general and does not account for your specific facts. No attorney-client relationship is created by reading this post or by using the Personal Injury Recovery Center. Deadlines, exceptions, and procedural rules vary by case type and by the parties involved; verify your specific situation with a licensed attorney in Louisiana before relying on any window described here.
Last verified: 2026-06-03.