In his research entitled ‘Medical error: the second victim’, Albert Wu first described physicians involved in incidents as the ‘second victim’, suggesting they also needed support.

According to this article, which was published in the British Medical Journal (BMJ) in 2000, a formal definition of this phenomenon is that a second victim is “a healthcare provider involved in an unanticipated adverse patient event, medical error and/or a patient-related injury who become victimised in the sense that the provider is traumatised by the event. Frequently, second victims feel personally responsible for the unexpected patient outcomes and feel as though they have failed their patients, second-guessing their clinical skills and knowledge base”.

Traumas may be psychological, causing stress, anxiety and flashbacks – some as severe as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Traumas may also be physical, such as fatigue, insomnia and nausea. These can potentially affect a healthcare professional’s career. For example, in a survey, 30 per cent of hospital pharmacists had recognised they had been a second victim themselves in the past, with 13 per cent contemplating leaving the profession as a result.