Dimensions of Physical Fitness Evaluation Procedures among Police Personnel: Systematic Literature Review

Being a police officer is a physically tasking occupation that requires much fortitude. The importance of having physically fit police officers cannot be emphasized. The research assessed the existing state of knowledge on the dimensions of physical fitness evaluation procedures among police personnel by conducting a complete literature review. The PRISMA principles were followed throughout the paper search and analysis. After examining electronic databases (Sport Discus, PubMed, Science Direct, and Scopus), 664 studies were retrieved. The chosen studies must include both male and female active police officers, be published in English between January and October 2022, and evaluate the participants' fitness levels. The quantitative synthesis comprised 9 studies with a total of 3275 male and female participants. The methodology of the physical fitness evaluations in all the studies was of high quality, less emphasis was placed on the health measures. The 2,400meter run is the most prevalent cardiovascular health test, followed by the sit-up, leg press, and push-up test, the vertical jump, the Illinois test, and body mass index. The amount number of push-ups an officer could accomplish, their handgrip strength, and their agility were found to correspond with their work performance. Due to the vast variety of fitness test dimensions and test selection procedures, standardization of fitness test protocols is required for accurate and meaningful comparability of findings. For future research on police fitness evaluation to be really unique, there is a need to further create a norm standard for various test batteries, primarily for the police population.


Introduction
In any Society, the maintenance of social order requires the existence of the rule of law as well as physically and psychologically healthy law enforcement agents.The enforcement duties that come with being a police officer make for a profession that requires a significant amount of physical stamina.Both before and during their shifts, the physical health of officers is vitally crucial, since it has a direct bearing on both their effectiveness and the protection of the general public.They might be needed to begin a pursuit, jump and traverse between covers, overcome the resistance of a belligerent, make a split-second decision that includes a high level of risk, or see horrifying events and circumstances.Police personnel is required to maintain high levels of physical fitness and overall health in order for them to be able to do their jobs efficiently (Filip et al., 2020).As a result of the strenuous nature of their work, police officers need to make sure they are physically healthy.However, only a few nations mandate that actively serving police officers achieve any sort of fitness standards.( (Dawes et al., 2017); Cocke et al., 2016).The vast majority of those who work in law enforcement agencies are not forced to participate in annual physical tests or be otherwise compelled to meet certain levels of physical fitness (Bissett et al., 2012).Many police officers have developed unhealthy eating habits and abandoned exercise since they are not compelled to maintain a minimum level of physical condition (Taylor et al., 2016;Dawes et al., 2017).Working shifts and coping with the stressors of police work can make it difficult for officers to maintain healthy habits such as regular exercise and the preparation of nutritional meals.This can increase the officers' risk of obesity, cardiovascular disease, and substance abuse.Working shifts and coping with the stressors of police work can make it difficult for officers to maintain healthy habits (DeNysschen et al., 2018Williams & Ramsey, 2017).There aren't many studies out there that examine the factors that go into determining police officers' physical fitness levels.As a result, the objectives of this research are to discover and evaluate the physical fitness assessments that are most frequently utilized for police officers, and (ii) to get an understanding of the physical fitness standards that are included in police officer job descriptions.

Protocol Procedures
A systematic evaluation was conducted to determine the dimensions of physical fitness tests performed to police officers and to describe the fitness levels of this population.Throughout this systematic review, the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines were followed to.Due to the fact that the authors gathered and evaluated data from previous studies for which the study investigators had previously gained informed consent, this inquiry does not require ethical approval.Consequently, an institutional review board did not provide clearance for this study.

Search Strategy
Topic-specific keywords were used to search significant literature databases for pertinent original research.Sciencedirect, Scopus, PubMed, and SportDiscus were utilized to find relevant materials.The databases reflect journals that produce high-quality papers and are extensively searched by scholars.Table 1 summarizes the databases, search phrases, and filters utilized.Two writers individually import EndNote references.After finding papers, duplicates were eliminated and the remaining articles were examined using the study's title and abstract.The three analytical articles originated external sources.After an initial screening, the remaining papers underwent a stricter screening based on inclusion and exclusion criteria (Table 2).From January 1, 2022, through October of this year, these investigations were conducted.Inclusion criteria to ensure research were as current as feasible and pertinent to law enforcement today.Only studies reporting at least one fitness test measure were included in this study.PRISMA shows search techniques (see Figure 1).A third author was called in if the two reviewers couldn't agree.

Study Selection
The author eliminated duplicate articles.Two writers chose papers using titles and abstracts.
An expert librarian helped with our study's retrieval.Two independent reviewers evaluated titles and abstracts of full-text papers that satisfied the requirements.Then, they reviewed the whole text of the papers based on inclusion and exclusion criteria and judged the research standard.Two reviewers worked independently throughout the procedure.When disagreements arose, a third reviewer was consulted.The whole procedure for selecting candidates is depicted in Figure 1.CS (Classical anthropometric), TG (Triglycerides), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), cardiovascular disease (CVD), Change-ofdirection speed (CODS) metabolic equivalent (MET) * significant AIP Atherogenic Index of Plasma ↑ increased

Physical Fitness Parameters
The most used aspects of physical fitness dimensions were aerobic and anaerobic capacity, agility, body composition, muscular fitness tests, and power, and flexibility.Aerobic capacity was examined in three investigations, while the anaerobic capacity was investigated in one (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022;Koropanovski et al., 2022).Muscular strength was evaluated in four articles (Heinrich et al., 2022;Talaber et al., 2022;Post et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022), muscular endurance was evaluated in one paper (Lockie et al., 2022), and muscular power was evaluated in three publications (Lockie et al., 2022;Post al., 2022;Heinrich et al., 2022).Other aspects of physical fitness such as agility and flexibility were evaluated with just one test (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Post et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022), respectively.In three separate investigations, participants were subjected to a variety of tests to determine their maximum physical strength.These included the bench press Talaber et al (2022), the deadlift Talaver et al ( 2022), and the handgrip strength (Perroni et al., 2022).Squats Talaber et al ( 2022), push-ups Lockie et al (2022); Talaber et al 2022 and Heinrich et al 2022), and sit-ups (Talaber et al, 2022) were the activities that were utilized the most often in order to evaluate a subject's level of muscular endurance.The vertical jump was employed to evaluate muscle power (Lockie et al., 2022;Post et al., 2022) and a range of aerobic capacity tests was done, including a 2.4 kilometer run (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022).In addition, a variety of other tests were done.(Lockie et al., 2022;Post et al., 2022).Tests of anaerobic ability were conducted utilizing intervals of 5 and 20 meters of sprinting.The sit-and-reach test (Lockie et al., 2022) and the Illinois run test Koropanovski et al (2022);Post et al (2022) were used to measure flexibility, while the shuttle run test Koropanovski et al (2022)and the Illinois run test Koropanovski et al (2022) were used to assess agility.

Measures of Health Features
Anthropometric measurement, also called a classical measurement, was utilized in seven out of nine research included in this review [Ardiana et al., 2022;Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie, Dawes et al., 2022;Talaber et al., 2022;Post et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022).In their study designs, they did not include many tests or questionnaires assessing health parameters.Some vital measures such as blood pressure and high/low-density lipoprotein are some of the other health indicators studied (Heinrich et al., 2022).There is just one published study (Tomczak et al., 2022) that makes use of the IPAQ.

Discussion
Due to the significant variation in fitness test dimensions and test selection techniques, Streamlining fitness test methodologies ensure comparability and precision.Each study showed a good level of methodological quality when evaluating physical fitness, however, health considerations were not given enough attention.Bench press (Talaber et al., 2022), deadlifts (Talaber et al., 2022), andhandgrip strengths (Perroni et al., 2022) were the most frequently employed test batteries in the publications analyzed.The 2.4 kilometer run, (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022), 200 push-ups (Lockie et al., 2022;Talaber et al., 2022), 100 sit-ups (Lockie et al., 2022;Heinrich et al., 2022), 100 squats (Talaber et al., 2022), and 200 push-ups (Lockie et al., 2022;Talaber et al., 2022).Many studies have found that officers' fitness levels decline with age (Ardiana et al., 2022;Dawes et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022).In the police community, heart disease is a real concern (Ardiana et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022;Dawes et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022).Despite the lack of a consistent difference in trunk size between the sexes, studies show that male police officers are typically heavier and taller than their female counterparts and that they also improve lower limb power, hand grip strength, upper limb endurance, and metabolic fitness (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022;Dawes et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022).A number of studies have shown that female police officers, specifically, need to work on their fitness, and more specifically, their upper-body strength (Dawes et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022;Koporanovski et al., 2022).As was also shown, conditioning should aim to enhance metabolic fitness and muscular endurance to boost both sit-up performance and running times (Lockie et al., 2022;Heinrich et al., 2022).Physical fitness (including anthropometric parameters) and health measures should be utilized together as a guiding concept for police conditioning programs in order to improve performance (Koropanovski et al., 2022;Lockie et al., 2022;Ardiana et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022;Tomczak, et al., 2022).However, health promotion strategies must be used to reduce cardiovascular and metabolic risk factors (Ardiana et al., 2022Dawes et al., 2022;Perroni et al., 2022).Standardizing the criteria for a fitness test was challenging because of the large number of tests considered.This was reflected, for example, in the fact that there were no generally accepted standards developed specifically for the police force.As a result, it was difficult to draw meaningful comparisons between the various measures of fitness, and this was considered as a weakness of the study.During this evaluation, a variety of criteria for measuring fitness were studied and ranked.Another disadvantage of this study was that it included studies involving non-police officials in law enforcement.

Conclusion
The results showed that the 2.4-kilometer run was the most used fitness assessment, followed by the push-up and sit-up test (both measures of muscular endurance) and body mass index (measures of body composition).Lower body strength was often evaluated using the vertical leap test, whereas upper body strength was typically evaluated using grip strength.The number of push-ups and the 2.4-kilometer run were strong indicators of future performance at the police.There was a correlation found between how well an officer did on fitness tests, including the number of push-ups, handgrip, muscle strength, aerobic capacity, and agility, and how well they did on the job.Most countries does not place importance to on-the-job fitness management of police personnel.There are scarce fitness norms for police population as most studies' findings were compared with the norm standards for the general or sedentary population.

Recommendations
Based on the above conclusions, the following are recommended 1. Annual or bi-annual aerobic fitness examinations (such as the 2.4 km run) may be especially helpful for testing fitness in the police community due to the high prevalence of cardiovascular disease among officers.2. For future research on police fitness evaluation to be really unique, there is a need to further create a norm standard for various test batteries, primarily for the police population.3.There is a need for more theoretical intervention studies to examine the health behaviour of police and how physical and psychological interventions can be used to improve overall health of the police population.

Figure 1 .
Figure 1.PRISMA a schematic of the search strategy

Table 1
They include fitness testing and assessments.We imported pertinent papers into Mendeley to prevent duplicating work.An experimental librarian led the initial search.Two reviewers individually analyzed titles and abstracts.Then, relevant fulltext articles were analyzed.A third reviewer was utilized to settle reviewer disagreements.
Studies were included if they (1) satisfied the inclusion criteria, (2) comprised healthy participants (those without exercise contraindications or who were too weak to participate), and (3) measured health and fitness objectively.Physical fitness parameters include body composition, flexibility, muscular strength, aerobic capacity, power, speed, agility, balance, coordination, and response time.