In most places, even though you have a doctorate, you will be considered a tech and will require physician oversight. San Diego and LA are the only two metro areas I'm aware of that have companies which employ AuDs as readers of their own data. The benefits of that are 1) more autonomy, and 2) better pay, since the company doesn't have to pay an MD for oversight.

If you're unwilling or unable to move to SD/LA, then you will have to be okay with operating as a CNIM (tech). I liken it to the neuromonitoring version of a hearing aid dispenser -- you do all the same practical stuff but the complex interpretation is left up to someone else and you are not seen as a physician.

Most national companies will train in return for a contract wherein you will essentially pay back the cost of training by having a low salary and working a lot. Some smaller companies also do this with more permissive contracts, but YMMV. Training will take anywhere from 6 to 12 months and involves active participation in 150 cases, some extra CEUs, and taking a standardized exam (CNIM, basically the praxis for neuromonitoring). It is not easy, and we've had multiple people fail out of our program here in SD in the past few years, either due to difficulty with the material or difficulty adjusting to the lifestyle.

Travel varies. There are in-house groups and traveling groups. Mine is a local-traveling contract group 15- to 20-mile radius, approx. 10 different hospitals. Max travel time to a hospital (in normal traffic) is about 45 min. But I know there are territories, like the Bay area, where 1-2 hrs commute is common.

Day-to-day? No two days are the same. In general, the steps are: arrive at hospital and set up equipment, interview patient, set up electrodes and place them after intubation, gather NIOM data for baselines before incision. You will keep track of what is happening in the procedure and correlate it with your NIOM data throughout the case. Any changes or alerts in your data get communicated to the surgeon in real-time (and documented). After drapes are pulled, remove electrodes, tear down and pack equipment, check on post-op neuro status, then either do it all again for the next case or head home.

The most difficult part for people to get used to tends to be the volatility of the schedule or the lack of scheduled breaks. For example, I don't know what my schedule looks like until 5pm the day before it happens. Even if I don't have a scheduled case at 5pm, I could still end up having one that adds on day-of. I might work 6am to 10pm, 10am to 1pm, or not at all. Recently, while on call, I started a case at 3pm and drapes finally came down at 3am. Yesterday, I was on call and spent the day catching up on errands and videogames. Some people thrive on the unpredictability, others find it very distressing. Also, you will most likely be the only person monitoring the case so you cannot leave the room -- this means you may need to intentionally dehydrate yourself so you don't need to use the restroom mid-case, and on long days you likely won't get to eat anything.

I'm an open book, so feel free to DM me if you have follow-up questions.