Face-transplant patient resumes smoking, worrying her doctors.

Jan. 19--TUCSON, Ariz. - The world's first face-transplant recipient is using her new lips to take up smoking again, which doctors fear could interfere with her healing and raise the risk of tissue rejection.

"It is a problem," Dr. Jean-Michel Dubernard, who led the team that performed the pioneering transplant in France on Nov. 27, acknowledged yesterday. The woman's French surgeons made their first scientific presentation on the partial face transplant at a medical conference here this week. The news about her smoking came even as American surgeons said that they were growing more …