Multimorbidity, age and costs. A path-model to evaluate moderated and mediated effects

Background/Objectives: It is considered conventional wisdom that both aging and illness are related to (increasing) costs. It is shown quite frequently that the effects of age and multimorbidity (MM) depend on one another since considerable interaction effects are observed: MM becomes a more and more important predictor for costs if the age of respondents increases. However, the moderating effect of MM for age (or vice versa) does not provide an answer on how morbidity serves as one explanatory link in the relationship between age and costs. For instance, several models exist to identify potential mediators of a…