Workplace public criticism

Hi,

Sorry, this is a bit long but I need to explain the context of my role. 

I'm an older man who works as a nurse for a private company. I don't work directly with patients in clinical settings any more, instead I help NHS clinicians understand the service the company provides, carry out training, deal with difficult patient issues amongst other things.

My reputation with the NHS is extremely good as I'm very honest with them in a way the company isn't. I know this from verbal feedback I get from the NHS staff.

• I was at a meeting this week with two of my bosses, one of them the CEO, and about 16 professionals from the NHS to whom we supply our service for their patients
• I knew the company had done a survey (for no apparent reason, it's not a contractual requirement nor did the NHS ask for it to be carried out) about my role and how I perform 
• The presentation turned into a public cricism session because out of the tiny number of survey respondents (34) several (between 1 and 7) depending on the question, gave some negative feedback
• The feedback was from random clinicians in my region (I'm responsible for all of Yorkshire and Humberside) and I know from the verbal feedback the key important teams in the NHS think highly or very highly of me because they tell me so, but the survey went out to other teams as well
• I suddenly found myself sitting in front of all these people with my 'failings' in graph form on a large screen 
•  
• The presentation turned into a public cricism session because of the tiny number of respondents and a small number of negative responses
• I had not been shown the slides in advance
• I had not been told in advance there was any negative feedback in the survey
• I had not been told my team's working practice would be changed as a result until I saw it on the presentation slides 

It was like having a work appraisal with a large audience, it was all sudden and shocking to me. They had done the same to a colleague of mine during a similar meeting via MS Teams which was bad enough but mine was a face to face meeting. He was very angry too. 

I've been engraged and deeply upset since this happened 3 days ago. I can't stop thinking about it. I feel publicly humiliated. Because of perseveration it's playing on a loop inside of my head, round and round, the humiliation and anger won't stop. I feel like a child, my emotions battering me. 

I feel that what they did was deeply unprofessional and any 'faults' with my performance should have been brought to me in private and done professionally, not as a sudden reveal in front of fellow nurses from the NHS.

Can anyone help me with the following;

Has anybody had a similar experience of employers blindsiding them in public with criticism?

Does the equality act apply here?

Does it cross the threshold of my protected traits?

Thanks