Physical fitness tests as a requirement for physical performance improvement in officers in the military police of the state of Paraná, Brazil

INTRODUCTION: Physical fitness is crucial for the work of military police officers. Over time, officers show a substantial decrease in physical fitness. State military officers must undergo a physical fitness test every year, but prior to 2015, failure on this test had no impact on career advancement. State Law No. 18.659/2015 included passage of the physical fitness test as a requirement for promotion for officers in the Paraná military police (Polícia Militar do Paraná). OBJECTIVES: To verify whether the obligation to undergo the physical fitness test had any effects on the physical performance of military police officers. METHODS: The physical fitness tests results from 2016-2019 (n = 1705) were entered into an electronic spreadsheet and stratified by year. The spreadsheet included scores on individual tests (shuttle run, upper body and 12-minute run) as well as the sum total across all tests. Then, descriptive statistics, normality test, Kruskal-Wallis H test, and post-hoc comparisons were performed using the Mann-Whitney U test. with a significance level of p < 0.05. RESULTS: Significant differences (p < 0.05) were observed on all variables in the physical fitness test when compared between the years of 2016, 2017, 2018 and 2019. Mean scores on the shuttle run (96.91 ± 7.54) and upper body tests (82.60 ± 24.81) were highest in 2019, while the mean score on the 12-minute run test was highest in 2017 (60.33 ± 28.38). The effect size of these differences (r) was small. CONCLUSIONS: The evidence suggests that the inclusion of the physical fitness test as a requirement for promotion can contribute to the improvement of physical performance in military police officers.