Dr. Helmut Retzek as Computer-Programmer and IT-Admin

Hi XXX, this is Heli (Retzek), please save my number.

Short description: I am now – in 2026 – a 63-year-old doctor with 300 additional courses, most recently specializing in neuromodulation.

At 22, I was the very first person at my university institute to buy a PC on credit, and then soon started programming in Assembler, Framework, and Turbo Pascal – from small tools like programmable keyboard drivers to larger tasks like a practical training program.

God, my first PC cost 30,000 schillings, my salary at university at the time was 2,000,- and the first hard drive with *5 MB* size cost 3,000 schillings. Back then, we still swapped CPUs to get 10% faster computing performance.

The first “Internet” used 240-bit modems, and sending an email to the USA took two days, plus two days for a reply, because the Vienna node called the Frankfurt node once during the night. It was fantastic!

At 25, I created a multitasking translation program on a Macintosh cube running Mac Pascal. With it, I not only autotranslated homeopathy texts but also created a text parser,

which later extracted a 2000-page homeopathy book from the translated texts—a kind of encyclopedia that was actually published in the Netherlands (“The Brick”).

Later, in my own practice, I became frustrated with the constantly crashing programs (around 1997), so I created a 60,000-line practice management program using MS Access in VBA.

This program is still running in, I believe, three other homeopathic practices today.

Later, in my own practice, I was frustrated with the constantly crashing programs (around 1997), so I created a 60,000-line practice management program using MS Access and VBA.

This program is still running in, I believe, three other homeopathic practices today.

I completely rebuilt it myself in 2018 and, instead of using Access, I used simple MS Word files as text containers. These are kept in a patient-specific directory along with all other patient PDFs (reports, photos, etc.) and are managed and accessed by the Access program. I still use it today.

Optimally designed for my practice structure because it perfectly reflects my workflow (since I created it myself).

I still use ACCESS in the 2003 version because with the old JET database in the background, there is simply NO data loss, no corruption, and everything is somehow self-healing and super easy.

A single database that’s copied every 30 minutes via an external tool as a backup (kept for 30 days) and that simply always works. We have 7 clients connected to it, and it’s super fast and almost always trouble-free.

But that’s no longer up-to-date. These days, I program with Replit tools, and in the long run, we’ll create something with Replit or a similar tool that optimally maps our workflows at the Vienna Braincenter. But first, these processes need to be clearly defined. Programming these days is just a night shift anyway.

I subscribe to ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, Grok, and Perplexity and use them alternately. My SOZO-AI projects are two ChatGPT projects working together.

Accordingly, I have working experience from the assembly level in MS-DOS up to the AI ​​level today, including programming skills, of course always from the perspective of an individual user/professional.Grammarians, but good enough that I know when a change to a program is complex or a two-minute hack.

Currently, in our practice, we have the backend and all the patient directories on a Synology NAS. I’ve tried others, for example, the best ones from QNAP, but they always give me ping timeouts on my Access database, causing the frontend/backend data connection to break. This is because my 2003 version of Access doesn’t automatically reconnect once it’s been interrupted, and the frontend seems to be constantly pinging the backend to ensure the integrity of the data connection.

Individual workstations have duplex laser printers—Kyocera Ecosys, HP, or Brother. My main printer is now a Brother color laser, and I accept the higher printing costs for color laser because it simply looks much better.

This Brother printer offers the best value for money with my monthly print volume of approximately 2,000 pages. Brother printers always work and are very inexpensive to purchase. They always come with network connectivity so I can send instructions to my secretary remotely. can print.

https://www.amazon.de/Brother-HL-L8260CDW-Farblaserdrucker-Drucken-schwarz/dp/B071YHF67Q/

We now have four Brother scanners in the office, including professional duplex scanners such as the ADS-2400N or, presumably, the replacement ADS-4700 – all network-enabled.

3 x Zebra label printers for blood labels and other labels – simply because they were easy to program and the labels are populated with patient data directly from the practice management software.

I’ve switched all my desktops to mini-PCs because they use much less power (and space). Otherwise, all workstations use laptops with a good keyboard and a good screen (usually 16″ WXGA or similar with at least 300 nits).

I know Lenovo has more problems, but they also have the best service. I call them, and someone is there the next day to repair the laptop if there’s anything wrong. Because of the radiation exposure, all laptops are connected via network cable.

Of course, we’ve always had the occasional network, contact, or device issue, but so far I’ve been able to resolve them. One problem was particularly difficult; it took many weeks to track down a faulty network cable that was severely throttling the network.

I’ve summarized this to emphasize how incredibly happy we are to have you on the team and that I finally don’t have to solve software, hardware, or network problems on my own anymore. I finally have a competent contact person who is “on our side” (i.e., a friend who looks out for our well-being).