Consider the difference between:
1. An 'armchair military buff' who reads magazines about tanks and guns, loves war movies,
    loves the history of the two World Wars, but has barely left his hometown.
2. A soldier who has had the experience of fighting on the front line of a major war.

Very different. It is like that with mania and psychosis. If you haven't experienced them,
then no amount of reading or medical training can help you understand what they are
like when viewed from the Interior. From the Exterior, there is little information to
help you figure out what is going on. Much as the armchair general can't make sensible
decisions about a battle without communications and intelligence from the front line,
so a mental health professional can do little to understand a person's actual problems
when they are in an episode of mania or psychosis. Understanding this, the job of
a mental health professional such as a nurse or psychiatrist, is to, if necessary:
1. Keep the sufferer out of danger, and keep them from being a danger, real or perceived, to others;
2. Give them the space and resources necessary to walk the path of Recovery.

These are important, but are only part of the picture. Getting the professionals
and a sufferer playing on the same side, from the same playbook, should be a major
goal, and considered a major success if achieved.

As for improving things, the perspective of a sufferer from the Interior of mania
and psychosis is surely important. And that can only come from those with genuine
Lived Experience. And that is why Lived Experience is so important.