I have several chapters filled with figures and tables, which are imported as pictures from other programs into Word 2003. Each image has a caption, added manually in Word and most images are referenced by several cross-references using the appropriate Word feature (so that references to Figure 5 automatically shift to become references to Figure 6 if I insert another Figure earlier in the chapter).

My problem is that if I decide I need to change a Figure/Table in my program outside Word (like Excel or Tableau), then when I delete the existing image and re-import the replacement image, I have to recreate the caption and redo all the cross-references (which will now display an error message like "REFERENCED IMAGE NOT FOUND"). This isn't a big deal to fix once or twice but I need to do this all the time and would like to make the process as easy as possible.

So, any suggestions on how I can replace a figure while maintaining its current caption and all the cross-references to it?

Should I try to have the images dynamically inserted so I could just replace them in their file folder? Is this possible?

Have you tried grouping the pic and the caption? I guess it is because it is still looking for the deleted image,because that is what it had there. Have you tried creating a text box then importing the image into the box? I hope whatever you do you have several copies of this saved in various places, because sometimes doing complicated things like this tends to make computers throw up their hands in horror and give up!