$re = '/(\b|\^(?:OR|AND)?)(name|first_name|last_name|city)\b/';
$str = 'city=Houston^ORlast_name=Cervantsz^ORfirst_name=John^name=don';
$subst = "$1user.$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