It's definitely worth considering the amount of time you will work once you finish training as the above poster noted. However, the other poster above is also correct in pointing out that you really ought not to pick a career based on work hours alone. Take into consideration the type of people you like to work with (peers and patients), the science of the field, reimbursement, and lifestyle, and anything else you feel is important to your happiness.
That being said, urologists generally do not work as many hours as their general surgeon colleagues. And their call is not as tough owing to the fact that fewer of their patients end up in the ICU and many of their procedures are outpatient or require only overnight observation postoperatively.
That's not to say that they have it easy. No surgical field has a great lifestyle the way derm or rad onc have a great lifestyle. On average, they work about 60 hours a week. That's 12 hours a day for 5 days. 6am-6pm monday through friday. You'll have a hard time making any of your kid's baseball games or afterschool activities with those hours. It is not an "easy" life.
It is true also that urology is more laid back, but that's not really from not having to work as hard or as much. It's just the type of personality that goes into a field where you have to work with piss and genitals. You've got to have a good sense of humor.
About general surgery. There are many programs out there that "comply on paper". No program is going to come straight out and admit to this, you have to go by secondary markers of noncompliant programs. Observe closely the residents during your interview. Are most of them available to answer your questions? Do they look well rested? Are they grumpy? Are their eyes sunken? Are there big ole dark bags under their eyes? Do they start cursing when their pager goes off? Do they scoff at questions about work hours? Some will try to mislead you and tell you how great their program is, but it is rare to find someone who just worked a 100+ hour week that will CONVINCINGLY tell you that they love their program. Read their body language. Trust your gut in these situations.
Don't accept anything less than a direct, unqualified "Yes, we comply with the work hours regulations". Most people will have difficulty answer giving you a straight up lie, so they will try to talk around the issue or give a vague answer. If the residents hesitate, hedge, or are less than direct, there is shadiness going on and you should be careful and dig deeper. Ask multiple residents. Ask the students you meet on the interview trail who go to that school or people who've rotated through there.
Another thing I've heard about is that people will work at the hospital for 80 hours and comply that way but end up bringing home a lot of their busy work...such as charting, dictations, etc., etc. I think this is a gray area, but 80 hours in the hospital + 20 hrs at home doing work you would normally do at the hospital but had to leave because of work hours feels like 100 hours to me...
