French woman has first partial face transplant

LYON, France (Reuters) - French surgeons have performed what they said on Wednesday was the world's first partial face transplant -- giving a new nose, chin and lips to a woman savaged by a dog. 

Specialists from two French hospitals carried out the operation on a 38-year-old woman on Sunday in the northern city of Amiens by grafting on tissues, muscles, arteries and veins from a brain-dead woman. "The patient is in an excellent state and the transplant looks normal," the hospitals said in a brief statement after waiting three days to announce the pioneering surgery.