Direct-to-consumer marketing for proton beam therapy

Direct-to-consumer marketing is alive and well in cancer. Lately I have been having more patients ask about proton beam therapy. I am no radiation doctor, but what I understand is that, although it may be better for some subsets of patients, conventional intensity-modulated radiation therapy is likely just as good for the majority of tumors. But the marketing is powerful, and radiation is a big revenue generator for hospitals, so I understand why it makes sense for them to advertise.

Since you know I am at the University of Wisconsin, and we are fiercely proud of our local tomotherapy — a novel way to deliver intensity-modulated radiation therapy — it should come as no surprise that some of our faculty have come out publicly questioning the aggressive marketing of Cyberknife directly to patients. Cyberknife is a method of performing (delivering?) radiosurgery via a robotic arm. Others have raised some concerns about bringing this kind of technology to patients too early (read the comments on this site, they are very entertaining). As Cyberknife is a competitor of tomotherapy, my concerns may smack of sour grapes, right? So, give me your unbiased opinion ... are patients getting all the information that they need to make an informed choice?