Last updated: March 14, 2014



How your personality affects your health

 Woman on exercise bike at gym.


Rare woman-to-woman HIV case reported

Rare woman-to-woman HIV case reported

A CASE of suspected HIV transmission from one woman to another has been reported, “likely acquired” while the two were in a ten year monogamous relationship.

Ten things you need to know about sleep

20/06/2000 PIRATE: Chronic insomnia.. / Sleep sleepless man generic resting


Chemists could be paid for services

 Vaccination protection influenza

HEALTH Minister Peter Dutton is considering paying chemists to provide services like vaccinations and has ruled out pharmacies in Coles and Woolworths.


The six surprise facts about your dreams

What are you thinking about right now?

What are you thinking about right now? Source: Supplied

WHY do we dream?

Some say dreams let us fulfil our subconscious fantasies. Others say they help us to hold onto memories, or keep our minds active in preparation for the emotion of the day ahead.

But no one really knows the real function of dreams. Though we do know they're very, very strange.

Here are six fascinating facts about how we dream, rounded up by The Huffington Post .

"Sweet dreams" isn't a thing.

Most of our dreams tend to be bad ones. Our dream experiences are negatively biased, according to a 2008 study.

"The 'default' dream is basically the bad dream," Dr. Ross Levin, a psychologist and sleep disorder specialist at Yeshiva University in New York City, told Reuters.

Some studies argue we've evolved to dream about scary situations more than positive ones so we'll be prepared for survival in case we come across a threat in real life.

Bad dreams can be a "warning sign" of health problems


And "any infection increases the amount of slow-wave sleep we have," Dr. Patrick McNamara, a neurologist from Boston University Medical School, told the International Business Times.

This "delays the starting point of when we enter dreaming sleep, so dreaming sleep starts late, and can erupt into consciousness", which can lead to vivid dreams and strange hallucinations.

Women have sexy dreams too.

It's not just guys having all the fun. Some 37 per cent of women reported having had a night-time orgasm, according to a 1986 study of university students. While it might be more obvious when men climax during their dreams, women are also having them too.

Dreams paralyse you - but only temporarily

During rapid-eye movement (REM) sleep, our muscles become paralysed - which prevents our bodies from acting out and going for a little sleep walk. Two powerful brain chemical systems work together to paralyse skeletal muscles, so we stay relaxed (and still).

You see more than you hear

Most often our dreams are silent - we see vivid moving images but with no sound.
