Ehde 2015.

Methods	Randomised controlled trial, single‐blinded, parallel group and single centre Study conducted in the USA Randomisation through computer generation Allocation by limited access database program
Participants	Population source: recruited from University of Washington Department of Rehabilitation Medicine Research. Registry and advertisements through National MS organisations. Flyers and referrals from University of Washington Multiple Sclerosis Centre. Numbers: randomised 163, telephone self‐management 75, control (telephone education) 88 Inclusion criteria: >18 years, self‐reported physician diagnosis of MS and 1 or more of the following: (1) moderate depressive symptoms indicated by a score of 10 to 14 on the PHQ‐9, presence of chronic pain (average pain intensity 3 in the past week) or significant fatigue symptoms, defined as a score 10 on the 5‐item (MFIS) Exclusion criteria: cognitive impairment (1 error on 6‐item Cognitive Screener), psychotherapy more than once a month, had participated in another study for fatigue, depression, or pain, moderate‐severe to severe depressive symptoms (PHQ‐9 score 15) Age: treatment group (mean age 51 years,range 25‐76), control group (mean age 53.2 years, range 26‐76) Gender: treatment group (women 67, men 8), control group (women 75, men 13) Type of MS: treatment group (relapsing remitting 46, progressive 29), control group (relapsing remitting 45, progressive 43) Pain type: chronic pain
Interventions	Treatment: telephone self‐management skills training Control: education on MS symptoms Duration: 8 weekly individual telephone calls delivered, 45‐60 minute sessions
Outcomes	Primary MFIS BPI PHQ‐9 Secondary Pain NRS SES PANAS PAM SF8 Health Survey Patient Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System Conner Davidson Resilience Scale
Notes	Funding: not described Conflicts of interest: not described
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Random sequence generation (selection bias)	Low risk	Random numbers were generated by computer software
Allocation concealment (selection bias)	Low risk	The allocation sequence was concealed from the research assistants who enrolled participants via a limited access database program
Blinding of participants and personnel (performance bias) All outcomes	Low risk	On 2 occasions research assistants became aware of a participant’s allocation
Blinding of outcome assessment (detection bias) All outcomes	High risk	On 2 occasions research assistants became aware of a participant’s allocation
Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias) All outcomes	High risk	For the telephone self‐management group there were 10 withdrawals during sessions and 4 during assessments. For the control group there were 6 withdrawals during sessions and 2 withdrawals during assessments
Selective reporting (reporting bias)	Low risk	All outcomes reported
Other bias	Low risk	No other bias detected