LYON, France (AFP) - The French woman who received the world's first partial face transplant is in excellent health and delighted with the result of the groundbreaking operation, her surgeon said.

Professor Jean-Michel Dubernard repeated a denial that the woman was injured after attempting to commit suicide, following a report in a British newspaper which said it had interviewed the 38-year-old.

Doctors transplanted a nose, chin and mouth taken from a brain-dead donor on to her lower face in the northern French town of Amiens last weekend, a world first for an operation that carries high medical risks.

Dubernard told AFP that his team planned to carry out "at least five" more facial transplant operations and that the university hospitals of Lyon and Amiens were seeking clinical research funding from the French health ministry.