If you need to prepend something to the array without the keys being reindexed and/or need to prepend a key value pair, you can use this short function:
<?php
function array_unshift_assoc(&$arr, $key, $val)
{
$arr = array_reverse($arr, true);
$arr[$key] = $val;
$arr = array_reverse($arr, true);
return count($arr);
}
?>