Table 3.

Doctors’ changes in their professional and personal life: themes

Main themes	N doctors (/26)	Example quote
1. Impact on career	10	“I felt hurt and victimized, as a result I stopped being a full time GP principal and became a part time salaried GP.”
2. Practising defensively	7	“Everybody who knows about the complaint in a professional capacity become very risk averse which impacts on your entire professional life.”
3. Practising poorer medicine	6	“I am fairly sure that this results in me practicing poorer medicine”
4. Negative impact on their personal lives	4	“My life was ruined.”
5. Impacted on the doctor-patient relationship	2	“I felt that our doctor-patient relationship was adversely affected.”

GP, general practitioners.