> i have 5 publications in major scientific journals, 2 as first author,
That is a good start.
Pull the papers of everyone and their brother who cited your papers. Contact them, they might be willing to give you a letter stating how your work was a foundation for their work. Helps to establish the impact on the field.
> both my first author research papers have been used by orthopedic
> implant companies to improve their instrumentation systems, and
> they have based their new total knee replacement system based on
> my two projects.
Do you have patents on that. ?
Do you have a connection into the R+D department of these companies ? A letter from the VP for R&D that your work was 'ground breaking' and 'pivotal in the development of x+y' and that the total market value of the project you contributed is $$xxmil can help to establish your contribution to the field.The MBA type industry folks are great in writing pompous sounding letters and nothing says 'we need you' more than $$$.
> i do not have any major memberships except Strathmore's who's who
I don't think that any of the subscription whoswhos is worth a dime in that regard.
> and i have peer reviewed articles for various journals as part of my
> ortho fellowship.
And signed with your own name ? Or the kind of deal were your consultant gave you the paper and then returned the review with his name on it ? Get letters from the journal editor how you are one of their invited reviewers.
> i just started my PM&R residency after > 7 years in Ortho and have
> no major experience there
So leave it out, it hurts you and doesn't help. For USCIS you have to build yourself up to be the 'eminent orthopedic surgeon Mr nk04'.
> one more thing, i can easily get 6-7 letters from academic professors
> in Orthopedics from the US and in Uk, Germany etc
Start working on it.
There are a couple of kits out there where for maybe $99 you can get sample letters, petitions etc. Typically people structure their petition based on the '10 commandments' of USCIS. The petition should be short and crisp, the adjudications officer has exactly 6 minutes to decide on the merits of your EA petition. You want him/her to get through as many points as possible, so he can tick off the little box on his form.
Bury them in supporting documents, not with a long winded petition.
If you are on a H1b or O1, you have nothing to loose by just firing off a petition. Within a year or so you should know whether they approved it or not. At that point, you can either file for AOS or CP.
(If you are on a J1 however, you don't want to file a petition. Nothing declares immigration intent more clearly than the filing of an I140.)
If you managed to get through medschool, residency and fellowship, you are definitely smart enough to do it yourself. All you have to loose is $165 and a couple of weekends of work.
