Elderly people have borne the brunt of deaths from Coronavirus
Staff will be tested for Covid-19 on a fortnightly basis, while residents will be tested every month.
Pauline Shepherd of the Independent Health and Care Providers said the sector is working closely with the Department of Health as testing is rolled out.
“We are still working with the department in terms of additional support that may be needed,” she told BBC Radio Foyle.
“In terms of staffing and in particular in terms of actually testing residents who may have dementia or learning disabilities that may obviously pose problems with carrying out tests.”
However, she warned The risk of coronavirus spreading in care homes is increasing as people begin to relax their own safety measures, the chief executive of Independent Health and Care Providers has said.
“The only way this virus can get into a care home is if someone brings it in and that’s either family visiting, staff or residents coming from other homes or hospitals,” she said.
“Care homes are doing the best they can. As the community relaxes, in terms of people being out, then that will increase the risk of the virus spreading and therefore it will increase the risk for care homes.
“The issue with this virus, as everybody knows, is that people can have the virus but not show any symptoms.
“So if we start repeating tests with residents every 28 days and staff every 14 days then that gives us a better chance of identifying the virus among people who don’t have symptoms.”
Ms Shepherd said that many care home staff and residents in the North of Ireland have had one-off test but this will allow more regular testing, meaning “we can take action”.
Health chiefs continue to urge the public to maintain a social distance of two metres as much as possible and wash their hands regularly to prevent the spread of the deadly virus.
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