$re = '/(\d+)\s+\.\s+(\d+)/m';
$str = 'Personal Expenses $ 14 . 56, Meals $ 65 . 54, Medical Bills $ 205 . 36';
$subst = "$1.$2";
$result = preg_replace($re, $subst, $str);
echo "The result of the substitution is ".$result;
Please keep in mind that these code samples are automatically generated and are not guaranteed to work. If you find any syntax errors, feel free to submit a bug report. For a full regex reference for PHP, please visit: http://php.net/manual/en/ref.pcre.php